From the Internet, we saw: “Dear Reader, Recently, a patent filed by Microsoft surfaced that could forever change the way Americans save, spend, borrow and invest. It’s U.S. Patent Number 060606 … According to a filing released by the United States Patent Office, Microsoft has invented a creepy, imbedded chip that uses biometric data to award currency to a user based on a set of key measurements. In other words, this chip tracks your heart rate, brain activity, body temp, and other physical data to monitor where you go and what you do – and also has the capability to transfer payments.” Why has Microsoft invented such a strange chip? And what does it mean for our money?

The simple and straightforward answer here is that there is a sinister intention behind this. It is meant to extend the digital reach directly to the consumer’s physical self without an intermediary step. This creates potentially great efficiency and a direct interface would provide ongoing feedback about useful parameters that might be actionable in a way desired by the consumer. The problem is that this creates a precedent for having the individual self under continuous monitoring in a way that could be used by the government or other agents wanting information, and the devices employed could be further enhanced to monitor many additional parameters that will not be publicly disclosed and hence the potential for invading privacy is quite serious and the consequences could be correspondingly quite dire. This goes against basic freedoms and the idea of liberty based on autonomy, free agency, and the right to privacy. Any time this is abridged via technology you can be sure there will be an ulterior motive capitalizing on that development to piggyback additional probing and manipulation that will not be advertised, but will be a part of what is introduced and will go on without the knowledge or awareness of human victims. This is no exception; it is paving the way for tighter and tighter control of humanity. As always, technology is sugarcoated in providing some kind of surface benefit, some kind of visible advantage. Seeing the downside is often too late in coming to prevent tragedy—that might well be the case here with this technology as well.