Credito BIOMEDICO introdotto dalla Citibank First Bank

from: http://www.raidersnewsnetwork.com/full.php?news=482

Citibank First Bank In The World To Introduce Biometric Credit
Added: Nov 10th, 2006 7:20 AM

By Johnson Choo, Channel NewsAsia

SINGAPORE : Singaporeans will be among the first in the world to use a biometric credit card.

Citibank - the world's largest credit card issuer - has chosen to launch its biometric credit cards in Singapore.

With the biometric payment system, card users do not even need to carry their cards with them.

The biometric system is expected to revolutionalise the way people shop and make payments.

Shoppers no longer need to present their credit card and sign for payment.

Instead, it will just be a matter of having a finger scan followed by the keying in of a PIN number.

The bank is first introducing the card to some 190,000 cardholders between the age of 25 and 34.

These users, according to the bank, spend an average of S$800 a month on their credit cards.

Jonathan Larsen, CEO and Country Manager, Citibank Singapore, said, "We're launching this biometric payment solution as part of our launch of the Platinum Clear Card. And for the next couple of months, we will focus on making the biometric solution available to our Clear customers. However, very shortly thereafter, we will be broadening this to all Citibank cardholders..."

The system uses technology belonging to Pay By Touch, a global biometric authentication and payment solutions provider.

And Citibank will be the first credit card issuer in the world to use it.

Citibank says both merchants and its cardholders will not incur extra cost in using this payment service.

It plans to eventually expand the service to all of its one million Singapore customers.

Besides credit payments, users will also be able to make debit payments from their savings accounts.

Citibank plans to gradually introduce this payment system to other parts of Asia Pacific. - CNA/ms

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/240445/1/.html

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La FDA approva l'uso di RFID per esseri umani

The VeriChip, the size of a grain of rice, is inserted under the skin with a needle in a procedure that takes less than 20 minutes to complete.

FDA approves computer chip for humans
Devices could help doctors with stored medical information

WASHINGTON - Medical milestone or privacy invasion? A tiny computer chip approved Wednesday for implantation in a patient’s arm can speed vital information about a patient’s medical history to doctors and hospitals. But critics warn that it could open new ways to imperil the confidentiality of medical records.

The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday that Applied Digital Solutions of Delray Beach, Fla., could market the VeriChip, an implantable computer chip about the size of a grain of rice, for medical purposes.

With the pinch of a syringe, the microchip is inserted under the skin in a procedure that takes less than 20 minutes and leaves no stitches. Silently and invisibly, the dormant chip stores a code that releases patient-specific information when a scanner passes over it.

from: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6237364/

Nuove catene elettroniche per nuovi schiavi

US group implants electronic tags in workers

By Richard Waters in San Francisco

Published: February 12 2006 23:02

An Ohio company has embedded silicon chips in two of its employees - the first known case in which US workers have been “tagged” electronically as a way of identifying them.

CityWatcher.com, a private video surveillance company, said it was testing the technology as a way of controlling access to a room where it holds security video footage for government agencies and the police.


Embedding slivers of silicon in workers is likely to add to the controversy over RFID technology, widely seen as one of the next big growth industries.

RFID chips – inexpensive radio transmitters that give off a unique identifying signal – have been implanted in pets or attached to goods so they can be tracked in transit.

“There are very serious privacy and civil liberty issues of having people permanently numbered,” said Liz McIntyre, who campaigns against the use of identification technology.

But Sean Darks, chief executive of CityWatcher, said the glass-encased chips were like identity cards. They are planted in the upper right arm of the recipient, and “read” by a device similar to a cardreader.

“There’s nothing pulsing or sending out a signal,” said Mr Darks, who has had a chip in his own arm. “It’s not a GPS chip. My wife can’t tell where I am.”

The technology’s defenders say it is acceptable as long as it is not compulsory. But critics say any implanted device could be used to track the “wearer” without their knowledge.

VeriChip – the US company that made the devices and claims to have the only chips that have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration – said the implants were designed primarily for medical purposes.

So far around 70 people in the US have had the implants, the company said.


Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2006