UK Firms To Implant Microchips Into Employees, What About Their Privacy?

Sources said that several companies in the UK are making a suggestion to have microchips implanted into their employees. This proposal has encountered the opposition of many people, primarily because of its humanitarian.

The Independent reported that a number of UK financial and legal companies are discussing with a Scandinavian firm, which will take its role to fit thousands of people with microchips.

A UK-based microchip business, BioTeq, also announced that they have already given 150 UK workers implants. Biohax, a microchip firm in Sweden, was also having discussions with some UK firms, one of which involved hundreds of thousands of workers.

Nevertheless, this move has raised questions about the privacy and security of the employees.

General secretary Frances O’Grady, UK Trade Unions Congress said:

CBI, aka the Confederation of British Industry, representative of 140 trade associations and 190,000 companies in the United Kingdom, also said that companies had better pay their attention to more urgent priorities and get their employees further engaged with the business.

On the other hand, Biohax, founder Jowan Österlund, stated that because of sensitive materials, the firms need to have certain access levels to control their employees and they saw that the solution are these microchips.

These microchips are just a tiny as a grain of rice, and it is implanted between forefinger and the thumb, under the employees' skin. Specifically, the devices make use of RFID technology (radio-frequency identification) with which people can replace IDs, physical keys card or even train tickets. In daily lives, the chips can help with minor tasks like unlocking doors, starting cars, and storing medical data.

As strange as it may sound, this is not the first time someone has thought of implanting chips into humans. Back in July 2017, a company specialized on vending machines implanted microchips into 41 volunteer workers.