biometrics
(April 2, 2008) There have been many news stories recently that indicate governments are increasing their capabilities to someday dictate to humans the types of behaviors that they will consider acceptable.
According to the Washington Post, intelligence centers across America have gathered personal information on millions of U.S. citizens. (Centers Tap Into Personal Databases) The article states that some of the information obtained included unlisted cellphone numbers, insurance claims, driver’s license photographs and credit reports. This type of government oversight into an individual’s personal data could obviously lead to potential abuse in the future.
The ACLU states that the Defense Department is using information that the FBI has gathered on some Americans. (ACLU: Military skirting law to spy) Some of the information obtained includes records of individual’s Internet service providers, financial institutions and telephone companies.
A Reuters news story reports that international passengers flying into New York will be identified by all ten of their fingerprints. (U.S. increases fingerprints IDs at airports) This of course implies that the government will keep an extensive database on people from all over the world.
Some companies are now requiring their employees to use fingerprint scanners to clock in and out of their jobs. (Fingerprint Scanners Help Companies Track Workers) These biometric devices can be used to monitor arrival and departure of their workers for the various tasks they may be assigned. In other words they could keep track of their employees’ movements throughout the day.
Miami police have requested that they be allowed to use spy drones to fly over urban areas. The stated purpose is to help them fight crime which is an understandable desire on law enforcement’s part. (Spy-in-the-sky drone sets sights on Miami) Of course this would be added to the arsenal of many governments who already use street cameras in order to monitor their citizens in cities such as Washington D.C. which will begin using 5000 cameras to watch different activities in their city. (D.C. police set to monitor 5,000 cameras)
RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) chips have been in use for several years now. They are used to track commercial products, passports, travel, animals and are even implanted in some human beings. (Radio-frequency identification) In Australia, RFID chips are placed in garbage cans in order to monitor the recycling habits of its population. (Bin Brother is watching you)
Individually, any of these methods of monitoring human activity could have beneficial aspects to it. However, when these technological advancements (along with many more that are on the way) are taken as a whole they can have a disturbing big-brother quality to them. From a biblical perspective just such a similar future society was prophesied in the Book of Revelation:
“16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.” (Revelation 13:16-18)
The beast in this passage is the man whom Christians call the Antichrist. He is a future world leader who will be the most powerful person on earth. As these verses indicate, he will also be able to monitor the economic habits of the people of the world. From a technological point of view, such a capability would have been impossible for the last two thousand years. As you have just read in this article, technology keeps increasing and the buying and selling habits of any individual may come under the scrutiny of this evil leader in the very near future.
Related posts:
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- Prisoners to be implanted with microchips (January 13, 2008) According to the British newspaper "The Independent", authorities are going to implant microchips under the skin of prisoners in order to monitor them outside the confines of prison: "Ministers are planning to implant "machine-readable" microchips under the skin of thousands of offenders as part of an expansion...
- Governmental monitoring spreading (August 29, 2010) In 1965 Intel co-founder Gordon E. Moore wrote of a technological trend in a paper. The paper noted that the number of components in integrated circuits had doubled every year from the invention of the integrated circuit in 1958 until 1965 and predicted that the trend would...
- Government and technology continue to merge (February 15, 2009) Recent news stories illustrate how technology continues to erode citizens' privacy. The first involves the much publicized story of New York Yankees baseball star Alex Rodriguez's steroid use. An article in the New York Times details the revelation of Mr. Rodriguez's drug use: (As Data Collecting Grows,...
- Technology, Government Monitoring, Economic Crisis (May 6th, 2010) There have been several news stories recently that may be prophetically related to the global government and economic devastation John saw in the Book of Revelation...God revealed the End-Times to His servant John and told him to write down the things he saw occurring on the earth...
- Why is Israel in the world news every day? (February 22, 2008) The Jews are in the land of Israel to stay. God's plans for the End-Times revolve around the modern nation of Israel. This is why a country two and a half times the size of Rhode Island is in the world news every day. Thus, it is...
- Earthquakes; Global Tax & Money; Government Monitoring; Islamic Ire; Doomsday Clock (March 1, 2010) In the wake of the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, MSNBC has an article on the increase of earthquakes around the world. ((Big quake question: Are they getting worse?) The author writes, "One scientist, however, says that relative to the time period from the mid-1970s to the...
- ABC News: Apocalypse Now: Floods, Tornadoes, Locusts (June 12, 2008) ABC is promoting a September television special in which experts will discuss the survival of humanity. (Apocalypse Now: Floods, Tornadoes, Locusts) In times of severe trouble most people look to God for the answers to what they are experiencing. Is what the world going through currently of...
- National fingerprint registry for U.S. citizens? (May 23, 2008) A Senate bill proposing to bailout the home mortgage crisis included a plan to create a national fingerprint registry for U.S. citizens. (Housing bailout bill creates national fingerprint registry) It seems this was going to be done under the radar according to the article, "What's a little...
- Unmarked helicopter patrols New York City from high above (May 23, 2008) A sophisticated surveillance helicopter flies over New York City monitoring the population below. (Unmarked chopper patrols NY city from high above) This is another example of the use of technology to fight crime......
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Tags: Antichrist, biometrics, fingerprinting, Revelation 13, RFID chips, spy drones, surveillance