The Chinese government, long-renowned for its tolerance, unobtrusive law-making, and general good vibes, has announced plans to begin outfitting its citizens with a new kind of ID card; one with an embedded chip that will include the holder's name, address, work history, educational background, religion, ethnicity, police record, medical insurance status and landlord's phone number. The cards will also carry reproductive history information, to further aid authorities in enforcing China's "one child" policy. Ostensibly, the cards will keep track of the large influx of peasants moving to cities, though Michael Lin, VP of China Public Security Technology, went on (in Orwellian fashion) to say; "If they do not get the permanent card, they cannot live here, they cannot get government benefits, and that is a way for the government to control the population in the future." Additionally, authorities are aggressively installing new security cameras around cities like Shenzhen, which utilize sophisticated recognition software co-developed by US companies like IBM, HP, and Dell. When reached for comment at the Ministry of Truth, the Chinese version of Big Brother was unavailable, as he was busy rationing out Soylent Green, Soma, and Ludovico technique treatments.

[Via Techmeme]

There's no two ways about it: the British love their security. And when it comes to employing technology for keeping the streets clean (and Segway-free!) and the terrorists squirreled away, the Brits put the rest of the world to shame, what with their four million CCTV cams (some with mic's and speakers, but no aggression detectors -- yet), head-mounted bobby cams, rolling license plate scanners, and heck, even their camera-watching cameras. So it should come as no surprise that the government's latest idea for ensuring total citizen compliance putting safety first involves the deployment of security cams that have the ability to see through people's clothing, among other high-tech surveillance devices normally confined to your favorite airport. According to a leaked memo supposedly seen by The Sun -- they of the journalistically-dubious "Page 3" -- Home Office officials presented Tony Blair's working group on Security, Crime and Justice with a proposal to install what are technically known as "perv cams" to facilitate the detection of weapons and explosives at strategic locations around the UK, along with millimeter wave imaging and THz imaging and spectroscopy systems. The Sun's George Pascoe-Watson goes on to note that proponents of the plan are aware of the likely public backlash over such a Sliver-esque scenario, which is why some officials have suggested that only females be allowed to monitor the "dirty" feeds; whew, what a relief -- women would certainly never abuse a power like this for personal gratification. Anyway, we're not putting much stock in what is little more than a rumored pitch to a bunch of bureaucrats at this point, so it's probably okay to put away those lead-lined Jockey's for the time being.

[Via Yahoo]