Girl to get tracker implant to ease parents' fears
UN | 03.09.2002 09:52
The parents of an 11-year-old girl are to take the extraordinary step of having her fitted with a microchip so that her movements can be traced if she is abducted.
The parents of an 11-year-old girl are to take the extraordinary step of having her fitted with a microchip so that her movements can be traced if she is abducted.
Danielle Duval will have the device implanted in her arm in the next few months, the scientist assisting the plan claimed yesterday. The miniature chip will apparently send a signal via a mobile phone network to a computer, which will be able to pinpoint her location on an electronic map.
The parents, Wendy and Paul Duval from Reading in Berkshire, said they had decided on the step after the abduction and murder of the schoolgirls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman.
"After the news of Holly and Jessica , we sat down as a family and discussed what we could do," Mrs Duval said. "Like us, Danielle needs to feel that she's safe at all times and could be located in a real emergency. I know nothing is ever 100% or foolproof, but we believe the microchip will go a long way towards protecting her."
Mrs Duval did not accept that the family were panicking or overreacting, saying it was only sensible for a parent to use technology when it was available. "If a car is stolen, it can be fitted with a computer to enable it to be tracked - so why not apply the same principle to finding missing children?" she said.
Yesterday several children's charities said they were unsure about the implant.
A spokesman for Kidscape, the charity aimed at stopping children from being bullied and sexually abused, said: "We do not think this is a good idea. Children should be taught about the possible dangers, rather than having something stuck on them that can maybe track them, and perhaps then only when it is too late."
A spokesman for the NSPCC said: "Parents and guardians must remember child abductions are extremely rare, and that the vast majority of abuse happens within the home."
The designer of the chip, Kevin Warwick of the cybernetics department at Reading University, conceded that some parents might abuse the system or overreact if their children were late home, but maintained that tagging was the correct course of action in the light of recent events.
He said: "The implant won't prevent abductions: nothing will.
"However, if the worst happens, parents will at least be in with a chance of finding their children alive."
He has called for an urgent government debate on the issue, and believes ministers should consider implants for all children.
Professor Warwick said there were a few technological problems to be ironed out, including exactly how to recharge the chip's battery, but he expected Danielle to be fitted with the device, under local anaesthetic by a doctor, in the next few months. "Her parents want me to proceed as quickly as possible, and I wouldn't waste their time if I thought it wasn't capable of working," he said.
Among the technical questions to be addressed is whether the chip should remain dormant in the limb until an emergency arose, or whether it should emit a signal 24 hours a day.
"This is why we need the debate to take place," he said. "In future it may be that only the police have the authority to allow the system to be activated. But, as things stand, parents can have that right themselves."
Danielle, who met the professor with her parents last week, said she had no concerns about being fitted with the chip. "I will feel so much safer knowing that mum and dad could find me in an emergency. The professor said the chip won't hurt, so that's OK."
Mrs Duval, 33, a school catering controller, and her husband, Paul, 34, a driving instructor, want their other daughter, Amy, seven, to undergo the treatment.
"We'll wait until Amy's a bit older, so that she fully understands what's happening," they said.
Danielle Duval will have the device implanted in her arm in the next few months, the scientist assisting the plan claimed yesterday. The miniature chip will apparently send a signal via a mobile phone network to a computer, which will be able to pinpoint her location on an electronic map.
The parents, Wendy and Paul Duval from Reading in Berkshire, said they had decided on the step after the abduction and murder of the schoolgirls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman.
"After the news of Holly and Jessica , we sat down as a family and discussed what we could do," Mrs Duval said. "Like us, Danielle needs to feel that she's safe at all times and could be located in a real emergency. I know nothing is ever 100% or foolproof, but we believe the microchip will go a long way towards protecting her."
Mrs Duval did not accept that the family were panicking or overreacting, saying it was only sensible for a parent to use technology when it was available. "If a car is stolen, it can be fitted with a computer to enable it to be tracked - so why not apply the same principle to finding missing children?" she said.
Yesterday several children's charities said they were unsure about the implant.
A spokesman for Kidscape, the charity aimed at stopping children from being bullied and sexually abused, said: "We do not think this is a good idea. Children should be taught about the possible dangers, rather than having something stuck on them that can maybe track them, and perhaps then only when it is too late."
A spokesman for the NSPCC said: "Parents and guardians must remember child abductions are extremely rare, and that the vast majority of abuse happens within the home."
The designer of the chip, Kevin Warwick of the cybernetics department at Reading University, conceded that some parents might abuse the system or overreact if their children were late home, but maintained that tagging was the correct course of action in the light of recent events.
He said: "The implant won't prevent abductions: nothing will.
"However, if the worst happens, parents will at least be in with a chance of finding their children alive."
He has called for an urgent government debate on the issue, and believes ministers should consider implants for all children.
Professor Warwick said there were a few technological problems to be ironed out, including exactly how to recharge the chip's battery, but he expected Danielle to be fitted with the device, under local anaesthetic by a doctor, in the next few months. "Her parents want me to proceed as quickly as possible, and I wouldn't waste their time if I thought it wasn't capable of working," he said.
Among the technical questions to be addressed is whether the chip should remain dormant in the limb until an emergency arose, or whether it should emit a signal 24 hours a day.
"This is why we need the debate to take place," he said. "In future it may be that only the police have the authority to allow the system to be activated. But, as things stand, parents can have that right themselves."
Danielle, who met the professor with her parents last week, said she had no concerns about being fitted with the chip. "I will feel so much safer knowing that mum and dad could find me in an emergency. The professor said the chip won't hurt, so that's OK."
Mrs Duval, 33, a school catering controller, and her husband, Paul, 34, a driving instructor, want their other daughter, Amy, seven, to undergo the treatment.
"We'll wait until Amy's a bit older, so that she fully understands what's happening," they said.
UN
Homepage:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/child/story/0,7369,785073,00.html
Comments
Hide the following 9 comments
It doesn't work
03.09.2002 11:05
johnny_boy
The thinner end of the wedge
03.09.2002 11:22
From what is the only real question.
Micro-chips implanted [at birth!?!] is the answer, but not to the above question, instead it answers to another agenda, and I don't think it takes too much analysis to realise whose agenda and whose solution this reveals.
My advice ... resist these cynical, exploitative and divisive attempts to control our children and their freedoms, if people began to openly talk about the real dangers to our children in the home [abuse, neglect, over-consumption, chemical/toxic overload, profit hungrey multinationals, mind numbing lowest common denominator divertisments, and all other forms of mind control] then maybe the dangers faced outside the home can both be put into perspective and addressed communily.
Until then expect only 'techno-fixes' that fix nothing but our diminishing list of rights and freedoms
jackslucid
e-mail:
jackslucid@hotmail.com
When in Rome....
03.09.2002 11:56
But conspiracy theorists have anticipated, well in advance, many things which have become reality, even the attack on America, not because they are psychic but because they know the modus operandi of the elite and see the same tactics being employed throughout history to control the masses and weaken us with revolutions, wars and lawlessness.
We told you they are altering weather patterns and damming up huge reservoirs in the jet stream to dump at will, as a weapon, while other regions are devoid of a drop of water and the devastating results are now plain to see. That is the proof! The elite blame ‘nasty humans’ for this ‘climate change’ and use it as an excuse to impose more penalties and restrictions or force Frankenstein foods on us.
We warned you that they are going to micro-chip every human being, like a commodity, or product and now you see it incrementally being introduced. First it’s voluntary, then you will be vilified for refusing it when it becomes compulsory for our safety and security. We are being held in a perpetual state of terror, by selective “news” by the same group who claim to be fighting “terror” and “evil” but are instigating it while they consolidate absolute power.
Understand this, Global Leaders are all part of the same Secret Society with a universal goal for a One World Military State. They despise the ordinary people who are pawns in their game and they thrive on hate, violence and fear. If that did not become crystal clear with ‘Operation Enduring Freedom’ you are mind-controlled zombie.
Centurion
At home
03.09.2002 11:58
Dan
hahaha
03.09.2002 12:20
UN
Cranky Times Ahead
03.09.2002 13:49
I dont quite
know whats going on with this latest shock- horror crime case, but I dont like the feel of it. It certainly seems to be associated with panic in the wider sphere. Think back to the mid- 1960s, when the established western world seemed to be under imminent threat from Maoism, USSR space- rockets, millions of blacks on the march, rampaging students and what have you. Then, the case of Myra Hindley and Ian Brady was elavated into an eternal spectre, one which has remained with us ever since. I suggest that its happening again, that the capitalist world has fallen to an imagined dread of the Islamic world, the "Mad Moor" of medieval times ressurected, and it seems we have a new Myra and Brady to go with it...
I certainly agree that the police checks on teachers are disengenuous, and seem calculated to instill the notion of police as moral arbiters of society as a whole. Conversely, if we really wanted to protect children, we would give them better information about the world, allow them to build their confidence, instead of cramming them into stupid uniforms and forcing them to attend crummy schools under threat of legal action. This whole child morality seems to have its base in christianity; read the bible to see that creepy Jesus is always going on about children, and as the modern school system is largely based on the old church sunday school system, the moralism is creeping back in. all told, its a morality created by the bourgeois class for the benefit of the same class, and can only add confusion to a proletariat already under massive pressure.
Space -Trotskyist
Never a truer word
03.09.2002 17:22
It is Satanists who sacrifice children, (Skull & Bones) not Christians. And if CCTV in the home was meant to be facecious, that is exactly where Big Brother is going with this and the humiliating, confiscated, candid film will make excellent prime-time TV viewing.
Centurion
Aye, but...
03.09.2002 21:11
Read yir bible, pal. Yon guy up on the mountain wi his wean, ready tae cut him open, til the big God guy goes: "naw, naw, ah'm only joking, mate, it was just a wee test, bit well done aw the same."
They wis always at it. Stonin folks fur fuck all, sacrificing anyfuckinthing they could get their hauns on, so they would, long as some bastard in authority telt them tae.
And wheres yir proof ae satanic sacrifice, by the way, eh? Orkney or some ither such shite? Some ither nonsense invented by the authorities to make ye feart?
"Oh, it's weird an scarey, must be some weird cult, couldnae be just a symptom ae a fukt up sick society based on repression an exploitation, could it?"
Part fae that, I agree wi all above. Fucked up, eh? Lets have a wee whinge aboot it, an go back tae playin at truth dissemination, conspiracy theorisin, while the whole fuckin world burns.
Authority is the problem. Get rid ae it. Or gie up.
Nae gods, nae fuckin masters.
Devil's arsehole
Centurion
04.09.2002 11:20
johnny_boy