Essentially, the new procedure being introduced is a wireless payment program that allows passengers to wave their smartphones in front of a special sensor in order to purchase a ticket for travel. The sensor is located on the ticket vending machine and both the train and bus tickets are accessed via Google Wallet – an app that provides for wireless payment capabilities. In the article mentioned above, I argued that the implementation of such technology is the foreshadowing of the coming cashless society which itself will play a major role in the totalitarian police state control grid being established right before our eyes.
Taking the cashless control grid one step further, an article published on August 8, 2011 in Technology Review, entitled “Beyond Cell Phone Wallets, Biometrics Promise Truly Wallet-Free Future,” explains that major corporations are not even waiting for the “digital wallet” to catch on. They are actually moving forward with a system that will allow for an individual to swipe their palm, not their phone, in front of a digital recognition device in order to gain access to various buildings, pay for merchandise, or otherwise identify oneself.
The new system, known as PalmSecure, is not Near Field Communication, however. PalmSecure requires no tangible hardware on the part of the user, so phones are not necessary. All it requires is that the user wave his/her hands in front of an electronic reader and the small device reads the unique pattern of veins by way of near-infrared light. Indeed, this new type of technology, even this specific product, is already being introduced all over the United States.
For instance, New York University’s Langone Medical Center has already implemented the vein scanners in some of its medical facilities. Manufactured by Fujitsu, the scanners are being placed in the hospital under the guise of greater convenience (the marketing gift that keeps on giving) and faster access to medical records. Health histories, insurance forms, and other documents are all handled electronically and at a much faster pace with the help of the new vein scanners.
It should be noted, however, that almost every element of any control grid begins by being optional when it is first introduced to the target population. But, as more and more individuals acquiesce to the system, the more inconvenient and, subsequently, the harder it will become for the rest of us to opt out. Eventually, the ability to opt out will be removed altogether.
Schools, too, have begun to implement the Fujitsu systems. For instance, the Pinellas County School District in Florida recently announced that it was introducing the system in order “to identify students and thereby reduce waste and the threat of impersonation.”
Obviously, the introduction of the Fijitsu vein scanners in the NYU hospitals and the Pinellas County School District are simply more examples of how gradualism is used in order to condition the public into accepting these technologies as a fact of life. Particularly if the younger generation can be trained to accept palm scans even for the most basic and common goods and services, they and the generation that comes after them will never think to question the greatly enhanced digital control grid when it is rolled out into the general social sphere.
