This alert is a continuation of a series called 'Paving the way Towards the Mark', this one focusing on technology.
 
Technology in and of itself is inert but in the hands of fallen man, it can be used for both good and evil. Man not always knowing the long term outcomes of his actions as well can intend to do good and in the end cause great harm as well.
 
God is omniscient, however antichrist is not and once he arrives on the scene with his cohort the false prophet, they will need to use something to try to gain this advantage. Many believe the technology we see today will very soon bring this to fruition. In the past, I have called this artificial omniscience and the anti-holy spirit that due to constant surveillance forces people into some degree of restraint. We are already beginning to see this happen in some cases.
 
The two previous alerts in this series are posted on archive page:
 
The Eyes of the LORD vs eyes of Antichrist
 
LAW and Lawlessness: Paving the way towards the mark
 
BE/\LERT!
Scott Brisk

More and more, George Orwell's 1984 becoming reality-babies, students, elderly being 'chipped'.
AMERICAN FREE PRESS - By Mike Finch - July 14 & 21, 2008, Issue # 28 & 29
Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFIDs) are finding their way into and onto humans in many ways. There are several ways government and commercial entities are looking to profit through impressive ID and Global Positioning System (GPS) technologies. Verichip Corp. successfully marketed "Hugs" Infant Protection System to hospitals in 2005. Since then, infants at many major hospitals receive ankle bracelets something like what many people on probation are currently required to use.

The ankle bracelets were marketed as a remedy for hospital infant abduction. When a child is removed from the infant care area of the hospital, an alarm sounds. About 230 infants are abducted every year from U.S. hospitals. The Hugs system saved one child in 2005. This may be a good idea, but it lays the groundwork for later RFID tagging on children and elderly for "safety reasons." Some unverified Internet sources report that U.S. and European governments have plans to implant RFIDs in every newborn instead of using ankle bracelets.

A Rhode Island school plans to electronically track the movements of students using Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFID). Microchips will be attached to the students' backpacks next year. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other civil liberties groups say the RFID chips are an invasion of privacy. "Encouraging the placement of RFIDs on young children, even in this limited and questionable context, can only have the unintended effect of acclimating them to being monitored by the government in other contexts and wherever they go, as if it were perfectly normal and appropriate," the ACLU said.

The RFID chips will be accessed via satellites through tiny GPS systems within the chips. The school will be able to follow the children anywhere. It is likely, though, that young people will just choose to leave their backpacks at school when they do not want to be followed. School officials may then contend for further invasion of privacy, and require RFIDs to be worn on clothing, or possibly injected.

In 2007, about 200 Alzheimer's patients were implanted with non-GPS RFIDs in a market test done by Verichip. The devices held medical information that could be scanned with a special reader. Many more Alzheimer's patients and people suffering with dementia have been implanted since the 2007 pilot program. Soon after the market testing by Verichip, sample RFIDs were handed out at the Alzheimer's Community Care 2007 Educational Conference. In a 2007 Fox News report Verichip offered free RFID tagging for any interested party that wanted to tag an elderly parent.

Currently Verichip is reported to charge about $200 for the implant. The United Kingdom has concrete plans to implant RFID chips into prison populations. Other nations have been reported to use RFIDs on prisoners, including Sweden and several South American nations. The initial plans are to inject prisoners with RFIDs that can be read by a scanner, with limited access and limited amounts of information. UK Officials said they will soon implant chips with GPS capabilities to monitor a prisoner's location at any given time.

IBM recently applied for a patent regarding a system that would not only place RFIDs on all clothing items, but also track those items of clothing on a global scale. The patent implies that all clothing sold would have "globally unique" RFID tags in them in the future. The information would primarily be used for marketing purposes, but the government could also use such technology. "The exact identity of the person or certain characteristics about the person can be determined [through the use of this technology]," the patent said. "This information is used to monitor the movement of the person through the store or other areas . . . tracking information can be used to provide targeted advertising and to improve existing store systems and tracking systems."

The RFID information could easily be used with credit card information for identification. The power and scope of the proposed database would certainly have civil rights implications. Goodyear began using RFIDs in tires in 2003, and all other major tire manufacturers have tested, or are using, RFIDs in tires to prevent tire counterfeiting, reports RFID Update, an industry RFID website. The RFIDs could easily be used to track tires anywhere in the country by private or government interests. Plans are underway for a global tire recognition program, all in the name of stopping tire counterfeiting.

Hitachi created an RFID chip that is smaller than a grain of sand. The .002-inch-by-.002-inch chip can be imbedded in paper, and could be used to track just about anything. The chips do not have GPS capability, but can store a 38-digit number that can be read by a hand held scanner. This chip is 60 times smaller than the first generation Hitachi micro-RFID. The former smallest of the small, the Mu-chip, measures in at .4 millimeters by .4 millimeters and could fit on the tip of a pencil. The Mu-chip is already used to track and identify items and prevent forgery of concert tickets.

"Invisible tracking brings to mind science-fiction- inspired uses, or even abuses, such as unknowingly getting sprinkled with smart-tag powder for Big Brother-like monitoring," Associated Press said. The prediction that microchips will be able to interface with nerves and implanted in the brain in the next 30 years was recently put forth by a UK government think tank. The microchips predicted would be able to give sensory input, allow a sort of mind-to-mind communication (like an implanted cell phone) and allow direct to the brain marketing. This Orwellian prediction opens the door for direct mind control in true 1984 fashion.
Original Report Here

WORLD TRIBUNE [East West Services] - July 22, 2008
CAIRO - Arab League states have agreed to introduce a biometric system to protect their borders and also speed security procedures.

Arab border security chiefs have endorsed the procurement and installation of biometric systems at airports and sea ports. The chiefs convened in an Arab League session in Tunisia on July 17 as part of efforts to bolster security coordination.

"It's clear that biometrics would be vital in controlling the flow of terrorists and criminals in our countries," a participant said.

A statement by the Arab security chiefs endorsed the Iris Recognition Immigration System, or IRIS, for border control, Middle East Newsline reported. The statement said the system would enable arrivals to enter any country without examination by an immigration officer.

"Instead they can walk up to an automated barrier, look into a camera, and if the system recognizes them they can walk through the immigration counter," an Arab official said.

IRIS has so far been deployed at 35 land, sea and air border point across the United Arab Emirates. Officials said the system requires two seconds to identify the image. They said the error rate is 0.5 percent.

Under the recommendation, the biometric system would facilitate the flow of tourists and executives in the Arab world. Officials said frequent visitors would first be eligible to use IRIS. - - - -
Read Full Report

WIRED NEWS [Advance/Newhouse] >Danger Room Blog - By Sharon Weinberger - May 9, 2008
The Army's very strange webpage on "Voice-to-Skull" weapons has been removed. It was strange it was there, and it's even stranger it's gone. If you Google it, you'll see the entry for "Voice-to-Skull device," but, if you click on the website, the link is dead.

The entry, still available on the Federation of American Scientists' website reads:


The U.K.-based group Christians Against Mental Slavery first noted the change (they also have a permanent screenshot of the page). A representative of the group tells me they contacted the Webmaster, who would only tell them the entry was "permanently removed." - - - -


Original Report Here

* Emphasis Added

WBBM-TV CBS2/3 CHICAGO [CBS Corporation] - Reporting by Pam Zekman -  July 22, 2008
When travelers go to the airport, they know what kind of security to expect: luggage searches, metal detectors and shoe inspections.

It's all part of our post 9-11 reality enforced by the Transportation Security Adminstration. But as CBS 2 Investigator Pam Zekman reports, thousands of travelers have complained that some of these screenings can become abusive and even x-rated.

For arguing with a TSA agent, Robin Kassner wound up being slammed to the floor. She's filed a lawsuit. . . .

In Chicago, people like Robert Perry are subjected to exhaustive security checks. He was patted down, his wheel chair was examined and his hands were swabbed, all in public view in a see-through room at the security checkpoint. Perry, 71, is not alone. . . .

Perry was also taken to a see-through room by a TSA agent when his artificial knee set off the metal detector. . . .

At that point, Perry was standing in his underwear in public view. He asked to see a supervisor. That made things worse. . . .

TSA officials said that when the metal detectors go off, their agents must resolve what caused the alarm. But experts have said it's important to use common sense when balancing security and customer service.

Carlos Villarreal, former director of security for the Sears Tower, said proper training is crucial. "When you're wanding somebody and you can identify which part of the body set of the alarm, that should be sufficient to clear a person," Villarreal said.

But all too often, it's not enough for 16-year old Michael Angone. She frequently flies as a member of the Chicago Children's Choir.

"I've had to completely take my pants off and show them like my entire leg," Angone said.

As a baby, Angone was diagnosed with cancer. Her parents, both Chicago police officers, had to have her leg amputated. She said she always warns TSA security agents that her prosthetic leg will set off the metal detector, but many insist on doing an embarrassing full body pat-down.

"I feel like I'm being felt up in public," Angone said.

Her father Bob Angone wanted to know, "What's the reason for all the feeling up, you know the groping at the back of the neck, the chest, underneath the bra, all the groping on her body, her buttocks?"

CBS 2 News asked the TSA those questions, but got no answers. . . .

This fall, O'Hare International Airport will get its first advanced digital x-ray machine. It allows TSA agents to see through clothes and discover any hidden weapons. Critics have likened it to a virtual strip search. - - - -
Read Full Report

* Emphasis Added

NEW YORK TIMES [NYTimes Group/Sulzberger] - By Laurie J. Flynn - June 24, 2008
SAN FRANCISCO - Microsoft, Google and PayPal, a unit of eBay, are among the founders of an industry organization that hopes to solve the problem of password overload among computer users.

The Information Card Foundation is an effort to create a single industrywide approach to managing identity online that promises to reduce drastically the use of passwords and create a system that is less vulnerable to fraud. . . .

The idea is to bring the concept of an identity card, like a driver's license, to the online world. Rather than logging on to sites with user IDs and passwords, people will gain access to sites using a secure digital identity that is overseen by a third party. The user controls the information in a secure place and transmits only the data that is necessary to access a Web site. . . .

One of the biggest tasks facing the group is getting the millions of Web sites to support the new system, a process analysts estimate will take a few years. - - - -
Read Full Report

THE WASHINGTON TIMES [News World Communications/Moon-Unification Church] - By Bill Gertz - May 16, 2008
The State Department will soon begin production of an electronic passport card that security specialists and members of Congress fear will be vulnerable to alteration or counterfeiting. . . .

About the size of a credit card, the electronic-passport card displays a photo of the user and a radio frequency identification (RFID) chip containing data about the user. The State Department announced recently that it will begin producing the cards next month and issue the first ones in July.

Security specialists told The Washington Times that the electronic-passport card can be copied or altered easily by removing the photograph with solvent and replacing it with one from an unauthorized user.

James Hesse, former chief intelligence officer for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Forensic Document Laboratory, which monitors fraudulent government documents, said the card should have been designed with a special optical security strip to make it secure and prevent counterfeiting. The selection of a card with an RFID chip is "an extremely risky decision," Mr. Hesse said in an interview.

"The optical strip has never been compromised," he said. "It's the most secure medium out there to store data."

Joel Lisker, a former FBI agent who spent 18 years countering credit-card fraud at MasterCard, said the new cards pose a serious threat to U.S. security. "There really is no security with these cards," he said.

Mr. Lisker, a consultant to a competitor for the electronic-passport card contract, said the State Department's selection of the RFID card shows it favors speedy processing at entry points more than security. He charged that the department "will not make changes until it is satisfied that compromises are occurring on a regular basis." - - - -
Read Full Report

* Emphasis Added

THE WASHINGTON TIMES [News World Communications/Moon-Unification Church] - By Bill Gertz - March 26, 2008
The United States has outsourced the manufacturing of its electronic passports to overseas companies - including one in Thailand that was victimized by Chinese espionage - raising concerns that cost savings are being put ahead of national security, an investigation by The Washington Times has found.

The Government Printing Office's decision to export the work has proved lucrative, allowing the agency to book more than $100 million in recent profits by charging the State Department more money for blank passports than it actually costs to make them, according to interviews with federal officials and documents obtained by The Times.

The profits have raised questions both inside the agency and in Congress because the law that created GPO as the federal government's official printer explicitly requires the agency to break even by charging only enough to recover its costs. . . .

Decision to outsource

GPO is an agency little-known to most Americans, created by Congress almost two centuries ago as a virtual monopoly to print nearly all of the government's documents, from federal agency reports to the president's massive budget books that outline every penny of annual federal spending. Since 1926, it also has been charged with the job of printing the passports used by Americans to enter and leave the country.

When the government moved a few years ago to a new electronic passport designed to foil counterfeiting, GPO led the work of contracting with vendors to install the technology.

Each new e-passport contains a small computer chip inside the back cover that contains the passport number along with the photo and other personal data of the holder. The data is secured and is transmitted through a tiny wire antenna when it is scanned electronically at border entry points and compared to the actual traveler carrying it. - - - -
Read Full Report

ASSOCIATED PRESS - By Devlin Barrett - January 11, 2008
WASHINGTON - Americans born after Dec. 1, 1964, will have to get more secure driver's licenses in the next six years under ambitious post-9/11 security rules to be unveiled Friday by federal officials.

The Homeland Security Department has spent years crafting the final regulations for the REAL ID Act, a law designed to make it harder for terrorists, illegal immigrants and con artists to get government- issued identification. The effort once envisioned to take effect in 2008 has been pushed back in the hopes of winning over skeptical state officials.

Even with more time, more federal help and technical advances, REAL ID still faces stiff opposition from civil liberties groups.

To address some of those concerns, the government now plans to phase in a secure ID initiative that Congress passed into law in 2005. Now, DHS plans a key deadline in 2011-when federal authorities hope all states will be in compliance-and then further measures to be enacted three years later, according to congressional staffers who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because an announcement had not yet been made. . . .

The American Civil Liberties Union has fiercely objected to the effort, particularly the sharing of personal data among government agencies. The DHS and other officials say the only way to make sure an ID is safe is to check it against secure government data; critics like the ACLU say that creates a system that is more likely to be infiltrated and have its personal data pilfered.

In its written objection to the law, the ACLU claims REAL ID amounts to the "first-ever national identity card system," which "would irreparably damage the fabric of American life."

The Sept. 11 attacks were the main motivation for the changes. - - - -
Read Full Report

Logo intended to standardize documentation across continent
WORLDNETDAILY - By Jerome Corsi - September 6, 2007
The first "North American Union" driver's license, complete with a hologram of the continent on the reverse, has been created in North Carolina.

"The North Carolina driver's license is 'North American Union' ready," charges William Gheen, president of Americans for Legal Immigration.

Gheen provided WND with a photo of an actual North Carolina license which clearly shows the hologram of the North American continent embedded on the reverse.

"The hologram looks exactly [like] the map of North America that is used as the background for the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America logo on the SPP website," Gheen told WND. "I object to the loss of sovereignty that is proceeding under the agreements being made by these unelected government bureaucrats who think we should be North American instead of the United States of America. . . .

Marge Howell, spokeswoman for the North Carolina DMV, affirmed to WND the state was embedding a hologram of North America on the back of its new driver's licenses.

"It's a security element that eventually will be on the back of every driver's license in North America," Howell told WND.

Howell explained the hologram of the continent was the creation of the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, a tax-exempt, nonprofit organization that, according to the group's website, "develops model programs in motor vehicle administration, law enforcement and highway safety."

Founded in 1933, AAMVA represents state and provincial officials in the United States and Canada who administer and enforce motor vehicle laws. The government of Mexico is also a member, though the individual Mexican states have yet to join.

According to the group's website, AAMVA's programs are designed "to encourage uniformity and reciprocity among the states and provinces."

"The goal of the North American hologram," Howell explained, "is to get one common element that law enforcement throughout the continent can look at on all driver's licenses and tell that the driver's license is an official document." . . . .
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The company has launched a three-month advertising campaign for its newly rebranded Health Link system, and hopes to convince 1,000 South Floridians to get injected with rice-grain-sized transponders linked to health records.
RFID JOURNAL [RFID Journal LLC] - By Claire Swedberg - April 28, 2008
VeriChip has launched a direct-to-consumer initiative known as Health Link, making its RFID system-previously branded as VeriMed-available to customers in South Florida's tri-county area. For $149, a consumer can have a passive 134 kHz RFID chip, compliant with the ISO 11784 and 11785 standards, implanted in his or her arm, with the transponder's unique 16-digit ID number linked to a database containing that individual's medical records and, if they so choose, a living will. . . .

According to Scott Silverman, CEO and chairman of VeriChip, the company changed the name of its system from VeriMed to Health Link because the new moniker is expected to have a wider appeal for consumers. Health-care data resides on a Web-based server hosted by VeriChip. After the first year, a patient pays $9.99 per month to keep that information active on the server.

Thus far, about 900 hospitals on the East Coast have agreed to participate in the VeriChip system. These hospitals have received RFID interrogators that can be used to read a patient's embedded VeriChip RFID transponder to automatically access that person's medical records. . . .

Thus far, Silverman says, only about 600 people in the United States have embedded VeriChip transponders. However, the company expects that number to rise as hospital employees gradually make it a standard practice to scan the arms of unresponsive patients being admitted to an emergency room in order to access their identity and medical records immediately. - - - -
Read Full Report

ASSOCIATED PRESS - By Chris Blank - May 29, 2008
JEFFERSON CITY - Your bosses can still make you work weekends and give you projects you loathe. But Missouri lawmakers have voted to make it a crime if they order that a microchip be implanted in your arm.

Forcing someone to get a microchip implantis already barred in California, North Dakota and Wisconsin. Legislation awaiting Gov. Matt Blunt's signature would make it a misdemeanor with a fine of up to $1,000 for a boss who demands that a worker get an implant.

Katherine Albrecht, an expert in consumer privacy and radio frequency identification, acknowledges that microchip implants might sound like "black helicopters and tin foil hats."

But Albrecht, the founder of AntiChips.com, and other critics argue there are tangible medical, privacy and religious worries driving attempts to pass laws banning forced implants.

"The people who oppose it don't understand how real the threat is, and the people who are gung-ho don't understand its power," Albrecht said.

She has been trying to persuade state lawmakers across the country to pass legislation regulating technology that allows for tagged items to be tracked when microchips send off a radio signal to special readers. The information can then be linked to a database. . . .

Radio tracking has been used for tracing stores' inventories, giving drivers toll-booth quick passes, linking unconscious patients to important medical information and even for uniting missing pets with their owners. But critics say the benefits pale in comparison to risks of cancer and identity theft by secretly lifting information off someone's microchip.

The nation's only federally approved maker of human microchip implants, Florida-based VeriChip Corp., has denied claims that its product can cause cancer. A spokesman for VeriChip did not immediately return a call seeking comment. . . .

Last fall, The Associated Press identified a series of decade-old veterinary and toxicology studies that linked chip implants to tumors in some lab mice and rats. Cancer specialists who were asked to review that data for the AP said they would not allow family members to receive implants and called for more research before widely implanting them in people. - - - -
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Scheduled to take effect on Jan. 1, 2011, California will require that all drugs distributed within its borders be accompanied by an electronic pedigree that documents their movement through the supply chain.
DISTRIBUTION CENTER VELOCITY [DC Velocity/Agile Business Media] - By John R. Johnson - From the April 2008 issue
- - -Currently scheduled to take effect on Jan. 1, 2011, California's law is by far the most aggressive drug pedigree law in the United States as well as the only one to require electronic tracking. As of that date, the state will require that all drugs distributed within its borders be accompanied by an electronic pedigree that documents their movement through the supply chain. The measure calls for pharmaceutical manufacturers to originate item-level e-pedigrees for their drugs and requires companies within the pharmaceutical supply chain (including distributors like Cardinal Health) to update those pedigrees upon each change of ownership. Although the law does not mandate the type of technology to be used, most manufacturers and wholesalers are turning to either RFID tags or two-dimensional (2D) bar codes, which hold more information than a traditional bar code. . . .

Though the masses may be flocking to bar codes, there are still a number of companies, including some industry heavyweights, that have been using RFID for some time now. Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer has been tagging every bottle of Viagra it produces since the end of 2005, and last year, the drug maker announced plans to begin tagging cases and pallets of overthe-counter pain reliever Celebrex. . . .

Applying tags to cases and pallets of Celebrex is much more complicated than tagging Viagra, which is produced on a single production line in France. Celebrex is produced on four high-speed lines at Pfizer's manufacturing facility in Puerto Rico.

"We wanted to roll out the technology being applied to Viagra somewhere else. Celebrex far outsells Viagra and it's a high-volume product," Bond said at the time. "Within the next four to six years, we expect to have something close to a universal track and trace [e-pedigree mandate], so we realize we need to spread our RFID capabilities into other areas." - - - -
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$1 Million Loss Leads to Security Cameras in School Cafeterias
THE WASHINGTON POST [Wash Post Group/Graham] - By Michael Alison Chandler - August 4, 2008; Page A01
For the first time, video cameras will monitor Fairfax County high school cafeterias this fall to keep students from pilfering chicken wraps or veggie burgers in the lunch line.

The region's largest school system is turning to video surveillance, already widely used on school buses and outside school buildings, to combat what officials say has become a pervasive problem: food theft. The school system's food and nutrition services department estimated that $1.2 million worth of prepared food was lifted from cafeterias in the past school year.

Board members decided last month that they could no longer swallow such losses, given a $150 million school budget shortfall and rising food prices. They approved a one-year tryout for cafeteria cameras at Annandale, Mount Vernon and Westfield high schools and Lake Braddock, Robinson and South County secondary schools.

Penny McConnell, director of food and nutrition services, said she hopes the cameras will curb theft and send a message to students that stealing from the cafeteria is no less serious than shoplifting from a store. "I would hate for them to make this a habit and take it into the community," she said. "They could get themselves into some serious situations that could impact their futures." - - - -
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FLINT JOURNAL, Flint, Michigan [Advance/Newhouse] - By Bryn Mickle - July 27, 2008
FLINT, Michigan -- Willing to spend $30,000 to put your name on a camera?

The City of Flint is looking for sponsors for surveillance cameras that will be mounted around the city to keep a watch out for crooks.

In exchange for cash, the city will plaster business names next to police logos on the pole-mounted camera boxes that sport a blue police light that flashes 24 hours a day.

Don't have $30,000? Depending on the size of the check, smaller logos and even people's names can be placed on the boxes similar to those found on a NASCAR racer. . . .

Fliers with the company's name and city logo have been circulated touting the cameras and plans are underway to put a PayPal link on the city's Web site for camera sponsorship donations. . . .

About a quarter of the $400,000 price tag for Flint Township's network of 24 police cameras was paid by businesses who wanted cameras on their property, with the rest of the cost coming from a business development authority.

Although sponsors for the Flint cameras won't have their pick of an exact location, the arrangement troubles the head of a Lansing-based government watchdog group. . . .

"If it's such a good idea, why not use tax funds for (the cameras)?" said John Chamberlin of Common Cause. . . .

Chamberlin worries that areas with more cash may get preferential treatment, while poorer sections get less cameras. - - - -
Read Full Report

Pubs in Yorkshire have been ordered to ban people from wearing flat caps or other hats so troublemakers can be more easily recognised.
LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH [Barclay - PA: Conservative/centre-right] - By Paul Stokes - June 24, 2008
The Park Hotel in Wadsley, Sheffield, is the latest to be asked to impose the rule by senior police officers.

Mark Kelly, the landlord said: "Police asked us to ensure that everyone removes headgear.

"With pensioners, by the time they sit down their hats always come off anyway because they were brought up with manners so usually take their hats off indoors."

The measure, designed to prevent people from obscuring their faces from CCTV cameras, has been questioned by Barnsley's former Test umpire Dickie Bird, 75, well-known for his favoured white flat cap.

He said: "Asking a Yorkshireman to take off his flat cap - whoever heard of anything so silly.

"It's a Yorkshire tradition, men wearing flat caps. Although youngsters don't bother these days, older men still wear them and should be allowed to continue.

"I still wear a flat cap when I go out shopping and often leave it on when I get home and end up sitting watching TV with my cap on They look smart and they keep your head nice and warm."

A South Yorkshire Police spokesman said bans on people wearing headgear in public premises had been operated in banks and post offices for years.

She added: "There have been incidents both in pubs and other establishments when it has not been possible to identify offenders captured on CCTV because hats were hiding their faces."
Original Report Here

Travelers outraged by private research group's request
WORLDNETDAILY - September 20, 2007
Motorists in Colorado are expressing outrage over a weekend stunt in Gilpin County, about an hour's drive west of Denver, where highway checkpoints were set up so a private organization could ask for samples of blood and saliva.

"I don't think they're authorized to do what they're doing, and I view it as a gross violation of law-enforcement protocol," Roberto Sequeira, 51, told reporters for the Denver Post.

He said he and his wife were "detained" for about 15 minutes even after they protested they wanted to get home because of a sleepy child in their car.

Sheriff's officials were apologizing after they helped set up and run five separate checkpoints over the weekend.

They said workers for the Institute for Research and Evaluation were overly persistent in their demands of innocent travelers. . . .

Sgt. Bob Enney said the deputies' assistance to the organization involved stopping motorists at the sites along Colorado Highway 119 for "surveys" on any drug or alcohol use. Surveyors also requested that motorists submit to breath, blood and saliva tests.

Enney said several hundred motorists were tested, and some later complained.

Sequeira said he repeatedly asked if the questioners were law enforcement officials and said he was not interested in participating in the study, but still was not given clearance to leave.

He told the newspaper that he and his family were approached by two researchers, and even after his repeated refusals, officials offered his wife, who was driving, $100 to get the couple to take part in a breath test. . . .

PIRE spokeswoman Michelle Blackston told WND the deputies "did not stop" any drivers. "It was a voluntary survey.  . . .  Nobody approached them. There were signs saying that a survey was taking place. Nobody waved them down."

She said she was unaware whether the private organization reimbursed the county for the expense of having the deputies at the traffic sites. The organization's own researchers get the results of the work, she said. - - - -
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NEW YORK TIMES [NYTimes Group/Sulzberger] - By Saul Hansell - February 7, 2008
Soon you will be able to deposit checks by scanning them at home and sending them electronically to your bank. No need to visit a branch or even an ATM.

This is possible because of the Check Clearing for the 21st Century Act, passed in 2003, which allows banks to exchange electronic images of checks. Already about half of all checks are scanned by businesses or the banks they are deposited into and not shipped in bags back to the banks on which they were drawn.

Fiserv, the big transaction services company, has announced new software that will enable banks to let home users deposit checks by scanning them. It already has a similar service for small and medium businesses. USAA, the financial services company that serves the military, has offered deposits through scanners for two years, but the idea has not yet caught on. . . .

To use the service, consumers would sign onto their bank's Web site, activate a piece of software, type in the amount, and then scan the front and back side of each check they want to deposit. The bank has the option of immediately sending the check image to be cleared or to have a human review it first. - - - -
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NEW YORK TIMES [NYTimes Group/Sulzberger] - By Steve Lohr - April 17, 2008
In an article in The New England Journal of Medicine, two leading researchers warn that the entry of big companies like Microsoft and Google into the field of personal health records could drastically alter the practice of clinical research and raise new challenges to the privacy of patient records.

The authors, Dr. Kenneth D. Mandl and Dr. Isaac S. Kohane, are longtime proponents of the benefits of electronic patient records to improve care and help individuals make smarter health decisions.

But their concern, ... is that the medical profession and policy makers have not begun to grapple with the implications of companies like Microsoft and Google becoming the hosts for vast stores of patient information.

The arrival of these new corporate entrants, the authors write, promises to bring "a seismic change" in the control and stewardship of patient information.

Today, most patient records remain within the health system - in doctors' offices, hospitals, clinics, health maintenance organizations and pharmacy networks. Federal regulations govern how personal information can be shared among health institutions and insurers, and the rules restrict how such information can be mined for medical research. One requirement is that researchers have no access to individual patients' identities.

Under the current system, individuals can request their own health records, but it is often a cumbersome process . . . .

As part of a push toward greater individual control of health information, Microsoft and Google have recently begun offering Web-based personal health records. The journal article's authors describe a new "personalized, health information economy" .... It is the individual who decides with whom to share that information and under what terms.

But Microsoft and Google, the authors note, are not bound by the privacy restrictions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or Hipaa, the main law that regulates personal data handling and patient privacy. Hipaa, enacted in 1996, did not anticipate Web-based health records systems like the ones Microsoft and Google now offer.

The authors say that consumer control of personal data under the new, unregulated Web systems could open the door to all kinds of marketing and false advertising from parties eager for valuable patient information. - - - -
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