Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Inverness School Fingerprinting Five Year Olds
A primary school in Inverness has installed a £1,000 biometric system to track library books using pupils fingerprints.
Drakies Primary School is the first in the Highlands to make use of the 'Junior Librarian' biometric system and the children, in their innocence, have taken to it, seeing it as more like a game.
The human rights organisation Liberty questions whether the introduction of such systems can be properly regulated.
A spokesperson said: "Unfortunately these fingerprint schemes may be using technology just for the sake of it and without proper regulation.
"Before schemes like this become the norm we must question if the biometric data of children is being shared, has permission been sought from parents, and is there truly no alternative?"
Of course there are plenty other less intrusive ways of letting kids borrow library books, but unfortunately they do not fit the agenda of the petty, beaurocratic officialdom found in town councils who see the advantages of fostering meek compliance, at the earliest age possible, for future civil liberty losses such as ID cards and the National Identity Register, the DNA database and all the other forms of state surveillance gradually being rolled out with barely a murmer from parliament and the people of the UK.
Parents should be the first to be screaming blue murder at this sort of manipulation of their children for the state's benefit, and standing up for the rights of the child, instead of being herded along like sheep by a government with little regard for democracy and civil liberties.
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Drakies Primary School is the first in the Highlands to make use of the 'Junior Librarian' biometric system and the children, in their innocence, have taken to it, seeing it as more like a game.
The human rights organisation Liberty questions whether the introduction of such systems can be properly regulated.
A spokesperson said: "Unfortunately these fingerprint schemes may be using technology just for the sake of it and without proper regulation.
"Before schemes like this become the norm we must question if the biometric data of children is being shared, has permission been sought from parents, and is there truly no alternative?"
Of course there are plenty other less intrusive ways of letting kids borrow library books, but unfortunately they do not fit the agenda of the petty, beaurocratic officialdom found in town councils who see the advantages of fostering meek compliance, at the earliest age possible, for future civil liberty losses such as ID cards and the National Identity Register, the DNA database and all the other forms of state surveillance gradually being rolled out with barely a murmer from parliament and the people of the UK.
Parents should be the first to be screaming blue murder at this sort of manipulation of their children for the state's benefit, and standing up for the rights of the child, instead of being herded along like sheep by a government with little regard for democracy and civil liberties.
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Labels: Freedom, Highlands, Labour, Scotland, Surveillance
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