School To Use Retina Scans On Kids

from the you-have-no-privacy-anywhere dept

Continiuing on the theme of biometrics becoming a bigger part of everyday life, a new high school in London has decided that kids will pay for meals by having their retinas scanned. No more worries about being bullied for your lunch money, apparently. The real reason, they claim, is so that poorer students who are given meals for free won't be stigmatized when others notice they don't have to pay. Honestly, I don't see why this requires retinal scanners. Way back when I was in elementary school they had this neat system of "lunch cards" that were punched by the lunch lady. No one needed to know how much was paid for each lunch card. But, I guess that system didn't give the government a copy of your retinal scan.
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  • identicon
    dorpus, 9 Jan 2003 @ 2:51am

    Keep tabs on the poor

    This way, we'll know the retinal scans of poor kids before they turn into the next generation of criminals.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      just me, 19 May 2004 @ 6:13pm

      Re: Keep tabs on the poor

      i think thats a little harsh and really sterotypical!

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Wklink (profile), 9 Jan 2003 @ 8:44am

    When I was in high school...

    ...the poor kids always sold their lunch tickets at a 50% discount of the cafeteria prices. They'd use the money to buy something good off campus.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Alan Jackson, 3 Feb 2003 @ 7:43am

    retina scans for kids

    The irony of this story is that one of the "advantages" of the retina scan technology at this London school is that parents can put restrictions on what and how much their kids eat, according to an article I read from vnunet.com.

    So, the poor kids won't be ridiculed for being poor, but the overweight kids can be ridiculed when the lunch person says, "Sorry, Billy, your mom says you're too fat to have dessert."

    I have two words for this situation: BAG LUNCH!

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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