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Google’s creepiest idea yet: Password pills

Published May 30th, 2013 3:55PM EDT
Google Password Pills Tattoos

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If you think Google Glass is creepy, just wait until you hear about the company’s plans to develop “password pills.” AllThingsD reports that Regina Dugan, the former chief of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the current head of Motorola’s special projects division, revealed this week that she is working on “a pill that can be ingested and then battery-powered with stomach acid to produce an 18-bit internal signal” that transforms “the swallower’s whole body” into a password. 

In a similarly creepy vein, Dugan also said at this week’s D11 conference that the Google-owned Motorola is partnering with a company called MC10 to design “an electronic tattoo that can be used to authenticate a user” in place of the traditional password.

While neither of these initiatives is guaranteed to ever see the light of day, they do show that Google is seriously thinking outside the box in its long-term quest to eliminate passwords and make accessing content on the web easier. Whether any normal human beings ever want to have passwords permanently plastered to their bodies remains to be seen, however.

Brad Reed
Brad Reed Staff Writer

Brad Reed has written about technology for over eight years at BGR.com and Network World. Prior to that, he wrote freelance stories for political publications such as AlterNet and the American Prospect. He has a Master's Degree in Business and Economics Journalism from Boston University.