It kind of happened in slow motion. The secretary in a rush running down corridor towards me,carrying some goodies for forthcoming meeting. About 3 metres away what does she do? She trips. You know when your in an accident and things happen in slow motion.... Well, jam and cream cake catches my right shoulder, coffee literally goes all over walls and showers me on rebound. I catch a jam donut in my groin before secretary careers into me and bowls me over. I hear a loud ripping noise as I hit ground with her sprawled on top of me. When I look up there are two people staring down on us. One is my boss.

I get cleaned up and finally arrive at meeting. As I walk to my place two of women present giggle just as I feel wind up my ass. Yeah. I've ripped my pants in fall.

The rest of day is equally as much of a bummer. The Sony projector packs up, presentation ends early. It is raining cats and dogs when I leave office and I get soaked. When I arrive home my wife says 'How was your day?'

What more can you do with it?

The VeriChip can be used for many applications than just verifying medical records. In this fast changing world everything is technology enhanced, and places that spell technology also invite unethical and illegal activities such as counterfeiting, identity theft, unauthorized access, etc. The VeriChip can be used for personal identity verification so chip could contain your biometric information and scanners would read your chip and grant access to a special area that only you are supposed to access. Other applications could include but are not limited to controlling access to Intellectual Property, managing and tracking physical and intellectual assets, providing physical access to control solutions, enabling innovative time and attendance systems, providing automated data collection and monitoring platforms and much more. The chip with GPS (Global Positioning System) capabilities could also be implanted into children, so that it becomes easier for Police Department to trace them out, in events of kidnapping.

VeriChip could also be used to find lost pets or keep track of endangered wildlife, as well as find lost or stolen property. It could also be used as a means for security such as, airport security, authorization for access to government buildings, laboratories, correctional facilities and like. Convicted criminals or possible terrorists could also be tracked with this technology and prevent future attacks on time.

Is anything wrong with it?

While VeriChip seems to have no adverse side effects to its wearer, there are quite a few concerns over its usage pattern. One of biggest disadvantages is invasion of privacy of user. People wouldnt really like scanners scanning them for personal information wherever they go or satellites tracking them across globe. One of major concerns could be about third parties gaining information on Internet through either hacking or by selling sensitive data to unknown people. You might use these chips to safeguard your children from kidnappers, but there are possibilities of these chips being surgically removed and being disabled by kidnappers. There is also possibilitiy that convicted criminals could remove chips so authorities would be unable to track them. Most people fear an invasion of privacy as greatest fault of implanting microchips. A recent CNN poll said that about 76% of Americans said they would not want a device like VeriChip implanted on their children, while 24% suggested they would.

While amount of securities this chip might offer is overwhelming, at same time device seems weighed down by numerous concerns including invasion of privacy. Only time will tell whether this invention takes off or just bites dust.

Chris N. Fernando is a Sr. Staff Writer with Magazine 360 - an IT magazine published by ITNation, Mumbai (India). He has also worked as Technical Editor with Peer Technical Services and as Reporter for PCQuest and Living Digital magazines. He also writes for The Cheers.com.