Ay Carumba: microchipping middle-class Mexicans

Davey Winder
Sunday, 24 August 2008 00:14

Your IT - Home IT

It would appear that wealthy Mexicans are so worried about being kidnapped that some are prepared to be microchipped in order for them to be traced in such an eventuality...

Apparently, when it comes to being abducted (by humans rather than aliens) then Mexico is right up there with the best of them. Along with Iraq and Columbia the chances of being kidnapped in Mexico are higher than most anywhere else on the planet.

Which probably explains why some middle class Mexicans are apparently spending thousands of dollars in order to be implanted with a microchip transmitter under the skin. When combined with a pocket GPS-enabled device, the chip can help track the missing Mexicans even if they happened to be bundled in a car boot.

Of course, these grain of rice sized transmitters are nothing new. They are essentially the same kind of device that have been used to chip pets around the world for many years now.

It is even injected under the skin using the same type of syringe.

The main difference would appear to be in the marketing. By branding them as a personal security solution for middle class Mexicans, the cost of being chipped jumps from less than USD $100 to more than USD $1000 plus an annual upkeep fee.

Of course, with Mexican kidnappings rising by some 40 percent in the last 4 years the demand for something, anything, that might help keep someone alive has also risen.

The keep them alive aspect is all too real, as evidenced by the recent kidnap and then murder of a 14 year old boy.

Experts have questioned why the chip implant is needed though, other than to inflate the cost and make this sound like a very high tech solution to an age old crime. Indeed, it seems that the tracking is done when the missing Mexican presses a panic button on the GPS device in his or her pocket.

The chip plays no real role at all, other than to be useful in identifying the body should the kidnapping go pear shaped I suppose. I doubt that this is used in the hard sell though.