Microsoft Was Granted A Patent To ‘Mine Human Body Activity’

On March 26, 2020, at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic and in the midst of the lockdown, Microsoft was granted a patent by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Patent WO 060606 declares that ‘Human Body Activity associated with a task provided to a user may be used in a mining process of a cryptocurrency system.’

The patent goes on to state,

“A server may provide a task to a device of a user which is communicatively coupled to the server. A sensor communicatively coupled to or comprised in the device of the user may sense body activity of the user. Body activity data may be generated based on the sensed body activity of the user. The cryptocurrency system communicatively coupled to the device of the user may verify if the body activity data satisfies one or more conditions set by the cryptocurrency system, and award cryptocurrency to the user whose body activity data is verified.”

The ‘body activity’ Microsoft is referring to with regards to this patent includes radiation emitted from the human body, brain activity, body fluid flow, organ activity, blood flow, body movements such as facial movement, muscle movement and eye movement. It also includes other activities that can be sensed and represented by images, waves, signals, texts, degrees, numbers or any other information/data.

Dr. Vandana Shiva explains,

“The patent is an intellectual property claim over our bodies and minds. In colonialism, colonisers assign themselves the right to take the land and resources of indigenous people, extinguish their cultures and sovereignty, and in extreme cases exterminate them. Patent WO 060606 is a declaration by Microsoft that our bodies and minds are its new colonies. We are mines of ‘raw material’–the data extracted from our bodies. Rather than sovereign, spiritual, conscious, intelligent beings making decisions and choices with wisdom and ethical values about the impacts of our actions on the natural and social world of which we are a part, and to which we are inextricably related, we are ‘users.’ A ‘user’ is a consumer without choice in the digital empire.”

So what does our future hold? Where are we heading? So many initiatives today are being done under the guise of goodwill and necessity, and it’s not easy for some to think that these initiatives are instead more rooted in greed and the desire for power and control...<<<Read More>>>...