Your Fingerprint Buys Groceries in Seattle

lildogie writes: "The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports that a Thriftway grocery store is installing fingerprint scanners that they will use to identify customers." Each customer's payment method (credit, debit) is then automatically applied at checkout. Haven't they seen Charlie's Angels?

Comments

Prison like feel

[CmdrTaco (editor)]

While this may be a more secure way of paying for groceries than previous methods, the impersonal nature in which grocery stores are run is getting less and less satisfactory. Clerks pretend like theu know you, yet when they read your name from the receipt because of the frequent buyer card they force on you, they pronounce it all wrong. Now, we are going from being thought of as an improperly pronounced name to simple digital representation of a fingerprint.

Call me old fashioned, but I remember the days when the checkers knew me by my first name, and all I had to do to put the bill on my tab was give the checker my phone number. As a matter of fact, there are some grocery stores, even in Silicon Valley that still do this. Los Altos Hills comes to mind.

Interesting concept

[Harumuka]

Here's a mirror of the article in question.