UK: Prisoners "to be chipped like dogs"
01 January 2008
Ministers are planning to implant "machine-readable" microchips under the skin of thousands of offenders as part of an expansion of the electronic tagging scheme that would create more space in British jails.
Despite ongoing concerns about the security of existing tagging systems and prison overcrowding, the Ministry of Justice is investigating the use of satellite and radio-wave technology to monitor criminals. But, instead of being contained in bracelets worn around the ankle, the chips would be surgically inserted under the skin of offenders in the community, to enforce home curfews. The radio frequency identification (RFID) tags are able to carry scannable personal information about individuals, including their identities, address and offending record. The tags are already used to keep track of dogs, cats, cattle and airport luggage. The chips are also being considered as a method of "helping to keep order" within prisons.
A senior Ministry of Justice official confirmed that the department hoped to go even further, by extending the geographical range of the internal chips through a link-up with satellite-tracking similar to the system used to trace stolen vehicles. "All the options are on the table, and this is one we would like to pursue," the source added.
The move is in line with a proposal from Ken Jones, the president of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), that electronic chips should be surgically implanted into convicted paedophiles and sex offenders in order to track them more easily. Global Positioning System (GPS) technology is seen as the favoured method of monitoring such offenders to prevent them going near "forbidden" zones such as primary schools.
The tags, injected into the back of the arm with a hypodermic needle, consist of a toughened glass capsule holding a computer chip, a copper antenna and a "capacitor" that transmits data stored on the chip when prompted by an electromagnetic reader.
Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, said:
If the Home Office doesn't understand why implanting a chip in someone is worse than an ankle bracelet, they don't need a human-rights lawyer; they need a common-sense bypass.
Degrading offenders in this way will do nothing for their rehabilitation and nothing for our safety, as some will inevitably find a way round this new technology.
Liberty: http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk; The Independent 13.1.08