PositiveID - a microchip implant for health, I.D. and Credit

Jim Edwards

VeriChip (CHIP), the company that markets a microchip implant that links to your online health records, has acquired Steel Vault (SVUL), a credit monitoring and anti-identity theft company. The combined company will operate under a new name: PositiveID.

The all-stock transaction will leave PositiveID in charge of a burgeoning empire of identity, health and microchip implant businesses that will only encourage its critics. BNET previously noted that some regard the company as part of a prophecy in the Book of Revelation (because the HealthLink chip carries an RFID number that can be used as both money and proof of ID) or as part of President Obama’s secret Nazi plan to enslave America.

The most obvious criticism to be made of the deal is that it potentially allows PositiveID to link or cross-check patient health records (from the HealthLink chip) to people’s credit scores. One assumes that the company will put up firewalls to prevent that. PositiveID CEO Scott Silverman said:

“PositiveID will be the first company of its kind to combine a successful identity security business with one of the world’s first personal health records through our Health Link business. PositiveID will address some of the most important issues affecting our society today with our identification tools and technologies for consumers and businesses.”

Unless, of course, consumers don’t actually want to be implanted with chips, have their health records available over the internet, or have their medical records linked to their credit scores.

• Related:
• VeriChip TV Ad Confirms Critics’ Worst fears: They Want Everyone Implanted
• Microchip Implant Controversy: a Mark of the Beast or the Coming “Singularity”?
• Microchip Implant to Link Your Health Records, Credit History, Social Security
• Novartis Chip Implant Texts Your Phone When You Need Another Pill

Jim Edwards, a former managing editor of Adweek, has covered drug marketing at Brandweek for four years, and is a former Knight-Bagehot fellow at Columbia University's business and journalism schools. Follow him on Twitter or send him an email.

Web Buzz:

• VeriChip TV Ad Confirms Critics' Fears: They Want Everyone Implanted

  BNET Pharma - 23 days 4 hours 38 minutes ago

  VeriChip's TV ad for its Health Link implantable microchip that connects to your online medical records has spawned a backlash on YouTube

• VeriChip acquires ID-security company

  Modern Healthcare - 3 days 20 hours 20 minutes ago

  VeriChip Corp., a Delray Beach, Fla.-based company specializing in radio-frequency identification systems for healthcare providers and patients, has acquired the ID-security systems company Steel Vault Corp

• Microchip Implant Controversy: a Mark of the Beast or the Coming "Singularity"?

  BNET Pharma - 36 days 1 hour 20 minutes ago

  The news that Novartis wants a deal with Proteus Biomedical to produce a microchip implant called "Raisin" that will text your mobile phone when

• VeriChip Takes Off on H1N1 Win

  Seeking Alpha - 54 days 10 hours 56 minutes ago

  Zacks.com submits: An announcement today regarding the exclusive license granted to controversial chip-implant maker VeriChip CHIP for H1N1 detection sent CHIP shares hurtling nearly out of orbit -- up 178%, or over $2 per share -- to around $3.20 by Monday afternoon. Other news reports have cited that

• CSR buys rival Sirf for £91m

  Financial Times - 276 days 22 hours 25 minutes ago

  CSR, a British chip designer for Bluetooth wireless devices, has taken advantage of weak stock markets by snapping up a US-based rival at a knockdown price. The UK group has agreed to buy Sirf, a maker of microchips for GPS systems, in an all-share deal that values the US group at about £91m ($136m), a 91 per cent premium to its share price

Microchip Implant to Link Health Records, Credit History, Social Security

By Jim Edwards
Novartis and Proteus Biomedical are not the only companies hoping to implant microchips into patients so that their pill-popping habits can be monitored. VeriChip of Delray Beach, Fl., has an even bolder idea: an implanted chip that links to an online database containing all your medical records, credit history and your social security ID.

As this presentation to investors makes clear, the chip and its database could form the basis of a new national identity database lined to Social Security and NationalCreditReport.com. The VeriMed Health Link homepage describes the chip:

… a tiny, passive microchip (the nation’s first and only microchip cleared for patient identification by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration) and a secure, private online database that links you to your personal health record. Your Health Link is always with you and cannot be lost or stolen.

That database can be accessed by doctors and nurses:

About the size of a grain of rice, the microchip is inserted just under the skin and contains only a unique, 16-digit identifier. The microchip itself does not contain any other data other than this unique electronic ID, nor does it contain any Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking capabilities. And unlike conventional forms of identification, the Health Link cannot be lost, stolen, misplaced, or counterfeited. It is safe, secure, reversible, and always with you.

But VeriChip’s ambitions don’t end there, as this diagram indicates:

Yes, it shows your Health Link chip linked to Google, Microsoft, employers and insurers. The company also sees the VeriMed Health Link linked to your “identity security services,” through a separate VeriChip product, PositiveID. This slide show states:

PositiveID puts people in control of their personal health records and financial information, bridging the gap between secure medical records and identity security

PositiveID dovetails with Health Link:

Cross marketing opportunities: cross-sell the NationalCreditReport.com customer base the Health Link personal health record and vice-versa

Differentiates PositiveID as the only personal health record that offers identity theft protection

It’s a future in which your doctor tags you like a dog with a microchip that allows anyone with the right privileges to look at your medical records, credit history, social security number (see slide 6), and anything else that stems from that.

Suddenly, storing medical records on paper in locked cabinets inside a single doctor’s office starts to look like something we may not want to rush to give up.