Citizens in Mexico are purchasing computer chips that are implanted under their skin to allow satellites to locate them in the event of a kidnapping. 

From Reuters (via Yahoo News):

Affluent Mexicans, terrified of soaring kidnapping rates, are spending thousands of dollars to implant tiny transmitters under their skin so satellites can help find them tied up in a safe house or stuffed in the trunk of a car.

Kidnapping jumped almost 40 percent between 2004 and 2007 in Mexico, according to official statistics. Mexico ranks with conflict zones like Iraq and Colombia as among the worst countries for abductions.

The chips cost $4,000, with an annual fee of $2,200. 

Some security experts fail to see the benefits of the product. 

Most people get the chips injected into their arms between the skin and muscle where they cannot be seen. Customers who fear they are being kidnapped press a panic button on an external device to alert Xega, which then calls the police.

“Before, they only kidnapped key, well-known economically successful people like industrialists and landowners. Now they are kidnapping people from the middle class,” said Sergio Galvan, Xega’s commercial director.

Katherine Albrecht, a U.S. consumer privacy activist, says the chip is a flashy, overpriced gadget that only identifies a person and cannot locate someone without another, bigger GPS device that kidnappers can easily find and destroy.

She said fear of kidnapping was driving well-off Mexicans to buy a technology that had yet to prove useful.

“They are a prime target because they’ve got money and they’ve got a worry and you can combine those two and offer them a false sense of security which is exactly what this is,” she said.

The Kidnap and Ransom market is listed at $500 Million per year.