Implants and Human Rights, in Particular Bodily Integrity

Abstract

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology was originally developed for automatic identification of physical objects. An RFID tag---a small device attached to the object---emits identification data through radio waves in response to a query by an RFID reader which also supplies it power. RFID technology has been increasingly employed as a `barcode replacement' due to the number of advantages that it offers and has been used in production lines and the logistics chain of enterprises and are starting to penetrate other sectors including medical and health care, defence and agriculture. While the first recorded human implantation of an RFID device was in 1998, in 2004, the first RFID implant device was approved for human use by the United States Food and Drug Administration. No data about the owner per se is stored on the device, instead the ID number points to a corresponding entry in a centralised database and can be used to facilitate identification and authentication. The continued commercialisation of RFID implant devices approved for human use, along with a trend for technology enthusiasts and self-experimenters to implant a variety of more advanced RFID technology points the way to future application of these devices. Further explored in this chapter is the use of human implantable RFID in the areas of patient identification in health care, access to services, as a complementary tool for other identification methods, access control for mobile devices, smart environments and other potential longer term applications.