Digital Angel or Devil in Disguise?

A prototype of an implantable biometric chip capable of marking an individual's precise location and of monitoring him or her for life was unveiled in New York City recently. This week it was named Best in Show of 170 International Science Exhibitors...more below.

Applied Digital Solutions (ADS) received patent rights to new technology named Digital Angel (TM) on December 10, 1999. What sets Digital Angel apart from competing technologies is that it is a miniature digital transceiver specifically designed for eventual human implantation.

According to information released last year the implantable transceiver "sends and receives data and can be continuously tracked by GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) technology. The transceiver's power supply and actuation system are unlike anything ever created. When implanted within a body, the device is powered electromechanically through the movement of muscles, and it can be activated either by the 'wearer' or by the monitoring facility."

In a company press release dated February 15^th, "Digital Angel has generated a large and positive response from both the investing public and those who are interested in participating in the wide array of applications for this technology."

ADS also claims that Digital Angel has "a variety of potential uses, such as providing a tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced e-business security, animal tracking, locating lost or missing individuals, tracking the location of valuable property and monitoring the medical conditions of at-risk patients."

Following the Internet World Wireless 2001 award this week for "Best of Show: Client Services," Mercedes Walton, President and COO of Applied Digital Solutions, said: ``We have always had high expectations for the Digital Angel products. This award, is truly a validation of our faith in Digital Angel's ability to capture the imagination of the public. Consumer anticipation has translated into accelerated interest from potential partners and allies. We are eager to bring Digital Angel to the marketplace in a very timely manner...."

I bet they are, God help us.

To further advocate Digital Angel technology, Applied Digital Solutions launched a website http://www.digitalangel.net where viewers can peruse diagrams and read summary information.

Other manufacturers of sub-skin implants have quietly field-tested similar devices over the past few years. The London Times reported in October 1998, "Film stars and the children of millionaires are among 45 people, including several Britons, who have been fitted with the chips (called the Sky Eye) in secret tests."

Due to civil liberty and privacy issues, the ACLU announced opposition to mandatory microchip implantation when applied to humans. The ACLU is certain to be a strange bedfellow of Christians and conservatives concerning this issue.

THE FULFILLMENT OF PROPHECY?

Many Christians believe that, before long, an antichrist system will appear. It will be a New World Order, under which national boundaries dissolve, and ethnic groups, ideologies, religions, and economics from around the world, orchestrate a single and dominant sovereignty. Such a system will supposedly be free of religious and political extremes, and membership will tolerate the philosophical and cultural differences of its constituents. Except for minor nonconformities, war, intolerance, and hunger will be a thing of the past.

According to popular Biblical interpretation, a single personality will surface at the head of the utopian administration. He will appear as a man of distinguished character, but will ultimately become "a king of fierce countenance" (Dan. 8:23). With imperious decree the Antichrist will facilitate a one-world government, universal religion, and globally monitored socialism. Those who refuse his New World Order will inevitably be imprisoned or destroyed, until at last he exalts himself "above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God" (2 Thess. 2:4).

The Antichrist's widespread power will be derived at the expense of individual human liberties. He will force "all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six [666]" (Rev. 13:16-18).

For many years the idea that humans could somehow succumb to little more than branded cattle, and that rugged individualism would thereafter be sacrificed for an anesthetized universal harmony, was repudiated by America’s greatest minds. Then, in the 1970’s, things began to change. Following a call by Nelson Rockefeller for the creation of a "New World Order," presidential candidate Jimmy Carter campaigned, saying, "We must replace balance of power politics with world order politics."

During the 1980's President George Bush continued the one-world dirge, announcing over national television that "a New World Order" had arrived. Following the initial broadcast, President Bush addressed the Congress, saying,

What is at stake is more than one small country [Kuwait], it is a big idea--a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind: peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law. Such is a world worthy of our struggle, and worthy of our children’s future!

Developers of biometric implant chips employ similar language in announcing compatible global technologies, and many Americans consider electronically marking humans or implanting a series of digital equations under the skin to be the natural progress of advancing and necessary technologies.
 

IT SHOULD COME AS NO SURPRISE

Some people believe microchips are being developed for mandatory human implantation and that such chips will be the Biblical Mark of the Beast. These claim that bills such as the Emigration of Control Act of 1996, Section 100, would permit injection of microchips for identification purposes. This might be referred to as an invisible tattoo or electronic media under the skin. Is such a system of identification based on implantable microchip technology indeed being developed? The following are a few examples:

 As far back as 1973, Senior Scholastics introduced school age children to the concept of buying and selling using numbers inserted in the forehead. In the September 20, 1973 feature "Who Is Watching You?" the secular high school journal speculated:

"All buying and selling in the program will be done by computer. No currency, no change, no checks. In the program, people would receive a number that had been assigned them tattooed in their wrist or forehead. The number is put on by laser beam and cannot be felt. The number in the body is not seen with the naked eye and is as permanent as your fingerprints. All items of consumer goods will be marked with a computer mark. The computer outlet in the store which picks up the number on the items at the checkstand will also pick up the number in the person's body and automatically total the price and deduct the amount from the person's 'Special Drawing Rights' account."
 

 In the 1974 article "The Specter of Eugenics," Charles Frankel pointed out Linus Pauling's (Nobel Prize winner) suggestions that a mark be tattooed on the foot or forehead of every young person. Pauling envisioned a mark denoting genotype.

 April 20, 1976 patent is granted for an apparatus and method for remotely monitoring and altering brain waves.

 In 1980, U.S. News and World Report continued the warning, pointing out that the Federal Government was contemplating "National Identity Cards," without which nobody could work or conduct business.

 The Denver Post Sun followed up in 1981, claiming that chip implants could someday replace I.D. cards. The June 21, 1981 story read in part, "The chip is placed in a needle which is affixed to a simple syringe containing an anti-bacterial solution. The needle is capped and ready to forever identify something--or somebody."

 The May 7, 1996 Chicago Tribune questioned whether we could trust Big Brother under our skin?

 In 1997 applications for patents of subcutaneous implant devices for "a person or an animal" were applied for.

 The April 27, 1998, edition of Time Magazine runs the story, The Big Bank Theory And What It Says About The Future OF Money, in which they opine "Your daughter can store the money any way she wants--on her laptop, on a debit card, even (in the not too distant future) on a chip implanted under her skin."

 In August 1998 the BBC covered the first known human microchip implantation. (see documentation)

 That same month the Sunday Oregonian warned that proposed medical identifiers might erode privacy rights by tracking individuals through alphanumeric health identifier technologies. The startling Oregonian feature depicted humans with barcodes in their foreheads.

 Senator Robb's (Virginia) MARC (multi-technology automated reader card) Card Amendment was added to FY97 DOD Authorization Bill.

 Bionics technology is attempting to create organisms that contain linked organic (human cells) material with biometric chips for human implantation (documentation site)

 Scientists are also working on half-human, half-silicon chips (story)

  Click here for Hundreds of Supporting Documents, Recent News Stories, and Research links to Advancing Sciences of Implantable Chip Technologies

 Meanwhile, it's the year 2001, and Digital Angel is growing in popularity.

WILL DIGITAL "MARKS" SOON BE MANDATORY?

Microchip implantation is currently introduced as a voluntary procedure. But a report written by Elaine M. Ramish for the Franklin Pierce Law Center says, "A [mandatory] national identification system via microchip implants could be achieved in two stages: Upon introduction as a voluntary system, the microchip implantation will appear to be palatable. After there is a familiarity with the procedure and a knowledge of its benefits, implantation would be mandatory."

George Getz, the communications director for the Libertarian Party agrees, saying:

After all, the government has never forced anyone to have a driver license, [but] try getting along without one, when everyone from your local banker to the car rental man to the hotel operator to the grocery store requires one in order for you to take advantage of their services, that amounts to a de facto mandate. If the government can force you to surrender your fingerprints to get a drivers license, why can't it force you to get a computer chip implant? 

Note what the prophet said!

And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark [charagma; from Greek charax meaning to stake down into or "stick into"] in their right hand, or in their foreheads....Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six (Rev. 13:16-18)

A temporary victory was won against such ideas following the original news story by Raiders News Update concerning ADS's implantable microchip intentions. News services across the web ran our story resulting in an inundation by concerned readers. ADS then released this statement: "We are not pursuing any applications for embedded chips and we have moved away from that for a couple of reasons....There are a number of privacy concerns and religious implications -- fundamentalist Christian groups regard it [implanting computer chips] as the Devil's work."

Of course this is only a temporary reprieve. Wearing the Mark of the Beast like a wrist-watch is a clever way to move one step closer to the palm of your hand. These are differences in degree, not in kind.

And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. (Rev. 14:9-11)

Copyright © 2001 Thomas Horn

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