Wednesday, April 16, 2008

You are being watched..T-Ray Vision...

New technology that can "see" through clothing and detect what's underneath can now be used to scan crowds, making it a potentially effective tool to prevent terrorist attacks in public places.

The camera can see through people's clothes from up to 25 meters away, detecting objects.

The ThruVision T5000 camera picks up Terahertz rays, or T-rays, which are naturally emitted by all objects and can pass through fabric or even walls.

The camera can then image metallic and non-metallic objects hidden under clothing on still or moving subjects without revealing any body detail, according to its British manufacturer, ThruVision Limited.

While similar technology is being unveiled at airports around the world, the T5000 is designed to be used in large, open areas. With a range of 25 meters, the T5000 can screen people in public places, thus avoiding bottlenecks at border crossings or security checkpoints.

It also means people can be screened without knowing it.

Amid privacy concerns, ThruVision Chief Executive Clive Beattie said the image produced by the camera did not reveal detailed anatomy.

"It's almost a glowing light bulb," Beattie told CNN. "You don't see the detail that people might be concerned about."

Explosives, liquids, narcotics, weapons, plastics, and ceramics can all be detected by the camera's imaging technology, which the company says is completely safe. Unlike X-rays, the T5000 does not emit radiation -- it only picks up on it.

Euro over U.S. Dollar

The dollar sank to an all-time low against the euro Wednesday with U.S. inflation coming in three times as high as expected in March, on top of escalating food and energy prices.

The euro has climbed to record highs against the U.S. dollar after worse than expected inflation data.

Inflation also rose overseas and the euro reached $1.5966 after the EU's statistical agency Eurostat said that annual inflation rose on higher prices for transport fuel, heating, dairy products and bread. It was the quickest rise in 16 years.

The euro surpassed its previous record of $1.5912 set on April 10. It then fell back slightly to $1.5948, still well above the $1.5790 it bought in New York late Tuesday.

The euro rose because inflation overseas will likely muffle calls for the European Central Bank to lower its interest rate from four percent. The bank's primary mission is to combat inflation.

Lower interest rates can weigh on a nation's currency as traders transfer funds to countries where they can earn better returns, while higher rates are used to curb inflation.

The British pound, which slipped Tuesday on a series of dour economic reports, climbed to $1.9762 from $1.9619.

The dollar slipped to 100.84 Japanese yen from 102.04 yen following reports in the media that Merrill Lynch & Co. will announce $6 billion to $8 billion in new write-downs Thursday. The Wall Street Journal said Merrill's expected write-downs would bring the total since October to more than $30 billion and would mean the company's third straight quarterly net loss.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Labor Department reported that wholesale prices rose by 1.1 percent last month, while analysts had been expecting 0.4 percent.

The Federal Reserve has been cutting interest rates in an effort to combat the economic slowdown. If inflation keeps increasing, the Fed might be forced to stop cutting interest rates for fear that it would make inflation worse, but the slowing U.S. economy could ease those pressures.

Saturday, April 12, 2008

Cash, Charge or Fingerprint

Retailers Experiment With Biometric Payment To Speed Up Service And Prevent Fraud, A Move That Worries Some Privacy Advocates
By Ellen McCarthy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 9, 2005; Page D01

Three or four days a week, Darren Hiers gets lunch at a Sterling convenience store near the car dealership where he works. He grabs a chicken sandwich and a soda and heads to the checkout counter, where a little gadget scans his index finger and instantly deducts the money from his checking account.
Hiers doesn't have to pull out his wallet to buy lunch -- and if it were up to him, he'd never have to write a check or swipe a credit card again.
The finger scan used at the shop in Sterling, known as a biometric payment system and made by a Herndon firm, is just starting to be installed at convenience stores and supermarket chains around the country, another step in a revolution that is turning the human body into the ultimate identification card.
Already faces and fingerprints are used to track visitors coming into the country. Computer passwords are being replaced by thumbprints at some companies and iris scans are giving consumers in England and Germany access to their bank accounts at ATMs.
The owner of BioPay LLC, which makes the technology used at the store, predicts the finger scan soon will be ubiquitous, offering speed and convenience for consumers. But civil libertarians have raised privacy concerns, citing some recent problems. In February, ChoicePoint Inc., a background-screening company that collects personal information -- including biometric data -- said it accidentally sold more than 100,000 individual profiles to identity thieves.
For many people, a fingerprint means one thing: a police record. That association could be enough to make many people wary. The car rental business already has had some experience with this. Toward the end of 2001, Dollar Rent a Car began fingerprinting its customers in an effort to combat theft. The experiment lasted just four months, until consumer complaints forced the firm to reverse its policy.
Biometric payment systems work by connecting images of an individual's fingerprint to his bank account. At the Sterling convenience store, a BP gas station owned by Rich Gladu, users enroll by handing the cashier a personal check (verified with a driver's license) that is scanned into the computer. Then they place each index finger on a tennis-ball-sized reader that captures the unique characteristics of their fingerprints.
The enrollment process takes about two minutes and from that point on, consumers can make purchases just by punching a 10-digit code (like a phone number) into the countertop terminal and placing a finger on the reader. The funds are subtracted directly from the customer's checking account, as a debit transaction would be.
"It keeps me from having to carry cash or a checkbook" said Hiers, who sometimes stops by the Sterling convenience store twice a day to get lunch, fill up his gas tank and pick up rations for his hour-long commute home to Charles Town, W.Va. "It makes my life a little easier, especially if I just want to get in and get out."
That's exactly what BioPay President Tim Robinson likes to hear. His company makes the biometric technology used at the Sterling store and says it has a database of 1.8 million customers. Most of those consumers are using BioPay's technology as an identification verification for merchants cashing paychecks -- an application intended to cut down on fraudulent checks. Customers have to enroll to cash paychecks, so if someone tries to cash a fake paycheck, the system will flag it. But by this summer 150 retailers will have installed the payment system.
Lowe's Food Stores Inc. will test BioPay's system at four of its 110 supermarkets. Next spring, it plans to install the technology at the rest of its stores, most of which are in North Carolina. More than 80 Piggly Wiggly Carolina Co. grocery stores in South Carolina and Georgia already have biometric payment systems made by Pay by Touch, a San Francisco company.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Alaska’s Gull Island Oil Fields Could Power U.S. for 200 Years

By Mark Anderson

“Crude oil is the real ‘currency’ of the world,” said Lindsey Williams at a gathering of the Midwest Concerned Citizens group in Kansas City on July 22. But Americans will never hear about huge oil and gas reserves in the United States, which, if ever tapped, would bring today’s fuel prices at least as low as $1.50 per gallon and make America more energy independent.

As a Baptist missionary in the 1970s, Williams said he rubbed elbows with members of the world’s power elite—who boasted of detailed 30-year and 50-year plans to control the flow of oil and information.

A huge quantity of crude oil and natural gas exists under Gull Island, located in the waters of Prudhoe Bay in Alaska, says Williams. He cited key British Petroleum memoranda and related the statements of upper echelon oil officials who told him that Gull Island would be kept under wraps, limiting domestic supplies so Americans would someday see prices hit up to $10 a gallon at the pump.

“Every issue in the world today relates to crude oil,” said Williams. The U.S. occupation of Iraq and the saber rattling about attacking Iran fit into the crude oil matrix.

Iran is being targeted because it’s one of several countries that want to use their own currencies for oil sales, rather than using the U.S. dollar. Williams told AFP that any country that doesn’t want to “play ball” with the U.S. government and the financial and oil interests is, in essence, put on a hit list.

The United States, he said, learned that Iran intended to form its own bourse and not use the dollar for oil sales. Therefore, the notion that Iran is a menacing “almost-nuclear” country was trumped up, presented as fact via the corporate media and Iran is now in the crosshairs.

Other nations wanting more independence from U.S. meddling include Norway, Venezuela, Nigeria, Bolivia, Sweden and Russia.

The 30-year plan, which was first proposed three decades ago and is nearing fruition, included smug assurances from oil officials that the United States will triple its crude-oil usage and alternative fuels will not be allowed to gain enough ground to make a difference. They also noted that all foreign oil production will be scaled back to the United States and that Americans soon will pay $4 to $5 a gallon at the pump and could pay as much as $7 to $10 down the road.

In the early 1960s crude oil was selected as a tool of world control, Williams said, adding, “What we pay at the gas pump is a form of taxation.” The American consumer’s dependence on crude oil thus far has enabled people from foreign oil-producing nations to buy T-bills (U.S. treasury notes) in order to support the U.S. national debt and continued deficit spending. The need to support that debt puts the U.S. government in a bind, forcing Americans to remain dependent on foreign oil.

Williams, as a chaplain in 1970 when the trans-Alaskan oil pipeline was finished, ministered among the pipeline workers. However, as time passed he made a favorable impression with the top brass and was asked to improve worker-company relations. Next thing he knew, he said he was sitting at meetings of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and various meetings of oil executives over a three-year period.

He told AFP that the IMF-World Bank acts as a middleman between oil producing nations and refineries. In so doing, they set oil prices, he said.

The big event in that three-year period was in 1977 when an Atlantic Richfield oil executive told him, “We have just drilled into the largest pool of oil in North America—[and] in the world!”

That pool was Gull Island. It was said that there was enough natural gas to supply America for 200 years. But to this day, “not one drop” of that oil has been released to American refineries, Williams said.

Williams said the executive had warned him that the Gull Island find was highly classified. Do not repeat any of this, he was told. Obviously, that warning did not stop him.

The U.S. economy will tip into a mild recession in 2008

The world economy will slow sharply this year, according to an International Monetary Fund forecast, with the United States sliding into a recession amid housing, credit and financial slumps.

The IMF, in a World Economic Outlook released Wednesday, slashed growth projections for the United States — the epicenter of the woes — and the global economy as a whole.

Economic growth in the United States is expected to slow to a crawl of just 0.5% this year. The United States won't fare much better next year; the IMF projected the U.S. economy will grow by a feeble 0.6% in 2009.

"The U.S. economy will tip into a mild recession in 2008 as the result of mutually reinforcing cycles in the housing and financial markets," the IMF said.

Many private economists and members of the U.S. public believe the country has already fallen into its first recession since 2001. For the first time, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke acknowledged last week that a recession was possible.

An increasing number of analysts think the U.S. economy, which grew 2.2% in 2007, started shrinking in the first three months of this year and is still contracting. Under one rough rule, if the economy contracts for six months it is considered to be in a recession. A panel of experts at the National Bureau of Economic Research that determines when U.S. recessions begin and end, however, uses a broader definition, taking into account income, employment and other barometers.

To limit the damage, the Federal Reserve has been slashing interest rates since last September and has taken a number of extraordinary measures to avert a financial meltdown, which would have dire consequences for the U.S. economy.

"The financial market crisis that erupted in August 2007 has developed into the largest financial shock since the Great Depression," the IMF declared.

Problems started in the United States with risky "subprime" mortgages made to people with blemished credit and quickly spread into other areas, hitting more creditworthy borrowers. Foreclosures in the USA hit record highs and financial companies racked up multibillion-dollar losses as mortgage-backed investments soured with the collapse of the U.S. housing market.

The fallout gripped investors on Wall Street and in other countries, creating a panicky atmosphere that threatened to paralyze financial markets in the United States and beyond.

Against that backdrop, the IMF expects the world economy, which grew a hardy 4.9% last year, to lose considerable momentum. The fund is projecting the global economy to grow 3.7% this year and 3.8% next year.

"The global expansion is losing speed in the face of a major financial crisis," the IMF said.

There's a risk that things could turn worse, it cautioned.

"The IMF now sees a 25% chance that global growth will drop to 3% or less in 2008 and 2009 — equivalent to a global recession," the fund said. "The greatest risk comes from the still-unfolding events in financial markets, particularly the potential for deep losses" on complex investments linked to the U.S. subprime mortgage market, the IMF said.

Looking at other countries, the IMF trimmed its projection for Germany, with economic growth slowing to 1.4% this year and 1% in 2009. In Britain, growth will slow to 1.6% this year and next. France also will see growth decelerate to 1.4% this year and 1.2% next year.

Japan's economy will expand 1.4% this year and 1.5% next year. Canada's growth will slow to 1.3% this year and pick up slightly to 1.9% next year.

Global powerhouse China, which barreled ahead at an 11.4% pace last year, will see growth moderate to 9.3% this year and then strengthen a bit to 9.5% next year. India, which grew a blistering 9.2% last year, is expected to grow 7.9% this year and 8% next year. Russia, which logged growth of 8.1% last year, will see growth moderate to 6.8% this year and then 6.3% next year.

While the IMF is worried about the dangers of weakening global economic growth, it also expressed concern about the potential for inflation to heat up around the world, given sharp increases in energy and other commodity prices. "Risks related to inflationary pressures have risen," the fund said.

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Human Tracking

Step1:
Notice how this company introduces the RFID Chip as a life saving element.
To monitor products and livestock.

Digital Angel
GPS and RFID products are utilized around the world to save lives, ensure the safety of our food supply, reunite loved ones and improve the quality of life. We are a leading developer of technologies that enable the rapid and accurate identification, location tracking, and condition monitoring of what is important to people. Applications of our products include identification and monitoring of pets and fish with our implantable RFID microchips, identification of livestock with our ear tags, GPS based search and rescue beacons for aircraft, ships, boats, and individuals.

Step 2:

Now there agenda reveals itself, and humans are to monitored and controlled.

VeriChip Corporation is the world's premier Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) company for people. VeriChip serves primarily the healthcare market with a range of market-leading identification, location, and protection solutions. From the first and only patented, FDA-cleared, human-implantable RFID microchip to the only patented, wearable active RFID tag with skin-sensing capabilities, VeriChip leads the way in state-of-the-art RFID technologies.

Every day, the unexpected and sometimes unthinkable occurs. An elderly patient in a nursing home wanders off. A baby is abducted from a maternity ward. An incapacitated patient is brought into an emergency ward without any identification. VeriChip Corporation specializes in helping to safeguard people with the most advanced identification technology.

VeriChip offers a wide range of RFID security solutions, including:

  • Infant protection - offering hospitals a means to prevent infant abductions and accidental mother-baby switching
  • Wander prevention - installed in over 3,000 long-term facilities and helping provide residents with mobility in specified areas while preventing them from wandering off
  • VeriMed™ Patient Identification System - seamlessly retrieves stored medical records information within milliseconds. By waving the proprietary VeriMed scanner within close proximity of the chip, the individual's identification information and medical history can be retrieved to communicate accurate information when necessary - particularly for diabetic, emergency care, cardiac care or memory-impaired individuals.
  • Asset tracking – providing accurate and immediate tracking of assets or personnel within a hospital or hospital department.

As a personal identification and security technology, the VeriMed system can complement or replace more expensive biometric technologies that identify individuals by their unique biological or physical characteristics - such as fingerprints, voiceprints, retina characteristics or face recognition points.

VeriChip, by contrast, relies on implanted, tamperproof, microchip technology that provides access to a database containing pertinent information about the person. This information can save lives in medical emergencies and can facilitate security measures that would be difficult or impossible to implement using alternative security systems.

Learn the truth!