‘Biohackers’: Digital implants mean you’ll never forget your keys

The new frontier of digital implants will give us power and abilities we now lack.

Tim Shank can guarantee he’ll never leave home without his keys. Why? His house keys are located inside his body.

Shank, the president of the Minneapolis futurist group TwinCities+, has a chip installed in his hand that can communicate electronically with his front door and tell it to unlock itself. His wife has one, too…

Shank is one of a growing number of “biohackers” who implant hardware ranging from microchips to magnets inside their bodies.

Some biohackers use their implants in experimental art projects. Others who have disabilities or medical conditions use them to improve their quality of life, while still others use the chips to extend the limits of human perception. Shank, for instance, has experimented with a portable distance sensor that vibrates a magnet in his hand; it’s like a sonar system that lets him sense how far away obstacles are. He also considered installing a chip that would track his body temperature. But not every use case is so ambitious—for some, the chips are merely convenient ways to store data and unlock doors.

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.