Digital Angel unveiled

A NASDAQ-traded company has finally unveiled its long-touted and
highly controversial "Digital Angel" -- a subdermal microchip implant
designed not merely for keeping tabs on pets, but for widespread,
worldwide use in tracking human beings.

The high-tech device, engineered by

Applied Digital Solutions,
Inc. had its debut Monday before an overflow crowd of more than 300 invited guests at Cipriani 42nd Street in New York City.

The audience included U.S. Secretary of Commerce Norman Mineta, who addressed the crowd, as well as other government officials, potential joint-venture/licensing partners and press representatives.

Richard J. Sullivan, Applied Digital Solutions' chairman and CEO, waxed eloquent about the market potential of Digital Angel, claiming the company has "uncovered a total marketplace that is conservatively estimated to exceed $70 billion."

Randy Geissler, chairman and CEO of Digital Angel.net Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary, zeroed in on potential applications.

"Our analysis shows that we are well-positioned to move quickly into certain applications while developing a number of others. Two areas of particular interest are in the health-care arena," he said, "monitoring heart disease and respiratory disease patients." The tracking and monitoring of pets, he added, is also "right up our alley."

The demonstration, which was conducted by Dr. Peter Zhou and Dr. Keith Bolton, showed how Digital Angel "can be used to monitor a person's key body functions -- such as temperature and pulse -- and transmit that data wirelessly, on a real time basis, along with the accurate location of the person, to a web-enabled ground station or monitoring facility," according to a press statement.

The technology consists of a miniature sensor device, designed to be implanted just under the skin, that captures and wirelessly transmits the "wearer's" vital body-function data, such as body temperature or pulse, to an Internet-integrated ground station. In addition, the antenna receives information regarding the location of the individual from the GPS satellite. Both sets of data -- medical information and location -- are then wirelessly transmitted to the ground station and made available on Web-enabled desktop, laptop or wireless devices.

A more sophisticated version of microchip technologies currently used as

electronic ID tags for pets, Digital Angel is powered electromechanically through muscle movement, or it can be activated by an outside monitoring facility.

As WorldNetDaily has reported, in addition to locating missing persons and monitoring physiological data, Digital Angel will be marketed as a means of verifying online consumer identity for the burgeoning e-commerce world.

In August, Sullivan told WND, "We are currently talking to a watch maker who is interested in placing the device on the back of their watches." He added that "technology is being developed that would allow Digital Angel to function from the back of a cellular phone, transmitting bio-sensor information when carried by the user."

And in an interview last March, the chief scientist, Zhou, told WorldNetDaily he believes the implant will be as popular as cell phones and vaccines.

Digital Angel "will be a connection from yourself to the electronic world. It will be your guardian, protector. It will bring good things to you," said Zhou.

"We will be a hybrid of electronic intelligence and our own soul," he added.

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