Vending Machines Take Finger Scans Instead of Cash
The day has arrived where all the money in the world is at your finger tips. Or rather, all the money in your credit card is in your finger veins. Biometric scanners are popping up everywhere, and now Hitachi has debuted the first vending machine that will accept a finger scan instead of cash or coins. By linking the scan to a credit card account, customers can simply place their finger in the machine and purchase whichever snack goods they desire most. Its probably the best reward youll ever get for giving a vending machine the finger.
The biometric sensor in Hitachis new vending machine uses light to scan and read the number and orientation of veins in your finger tip without directly touching a sensor. This provides a unique code for access to a credit card account that has to be established independently of the vending machine. While the machine is only a prototype, and Hitachi hasnt yet decided whether or not to make a commercial version, the concept itself is more than enough to be causing a buzz. Its far from the first use of a biometric sensor, but it has the potential to be the most commonly seen application of the technology.
Even if the vending machine industry doesnt jump on Hitachis band wagon, the biometric sales option is ready to be explored. With credit card companies like Visa and Mastercard already providing a tap and pay system for cards, consumers may become more confident with payments that dont require signatures or even human-human interaction. This means that finger scans could very well become a break-out technology. If youre willing to tap a card, why not just point your finger instead?
Hollywood movies often portray biometrics as added levels of security for very expensive items or collections. Eye scans to enter bank vaults spring readily to mind. The speed of biometric verification, however, makes it just as sensible to go in the other direction. Need to pay $5? Just let the machine count the veins in your index finger. Its faster than reaching for your wallet. Which may or may not be a good thing. Its unclear if the hassle of paying for things has a profound affect on the way we spend money. There may be a lot more impulse purchases when you can pay for things by just tapping your finger.
Amazingly, this isnt the only way that vending machines are getting complex. There are vendors with LCD display and touch screens, and others with conveyor belts or claws instead of those twisting springs. I think that they serve as a good testing ground for emerging commercial technologies. After all, like new high-tech ATMs, they are one of the few public machines that interact with hundreds or thousands of people each day.
With biometrics looking to identify you through your ear, or even your brain, the finger vein technology from Hitachi seems like a more acceptable option. It will be interesting to see if the concept of linking credit cards to a biometric scanner becomes widely popular. Perhaps it will be adopted somewhere else. iTunes? Kindles? Pay toilets? (August 24th, 2009 by Aaron Saenz) http://singularityhub.com/2009/08/24/vending-machines-take-finger-scans-instead-of-cash
"To Achieve World
Government it is necessary to remove from the minds of men their individualism,
their loyalty to family traditions and national identification" Brock Chisholm - Director of the World Health Organization
"A society whose citizens refuse to see and investigate the facts, who refuse to
believe that their government and their media will routinely lie to them and fabricate a
reality contrary to verifiable facts, is a society that chooses and deserves the Police
State Dictatorship it's going to
get." Ian Williams Goddard
The fact is that "political correctness" is all about creating uniformity. Individualism is one of the biggest obstacles in the way of the New World Order. They want a public that is predictable and conditioned to do as it's told without asking questions.
"The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first." Thomas Jefferson