The Guardian reports that some clever dentists have modified RFID tags and are planning to implant them in people’s teeth:

“When you put all identification data in one place in the body there can be no mistakes. You have an immediate identification,” said Dr Thevissen. Teeth are particularly hardy and can survive for hundreds of thousands of years. Many extinct primates, for example, are known only from tooth fossils. “We want to store it in the tooth because it’s the strongest and longest lived body part.”

Plus it helps dentists diversify their offerings. They’re not just cleaning, fixing, and enhancing your smile any more…they are helping law enforcement track the whereabouts of primates.

I have a better idea, though. If the plan is just to provide uniqueness to the teeth, why not use complex or even decorative etching in the enamel instead of implanting radio tags? I think etching is far more likely to be both robust as well as secure. Computers can even easily scan and store data based on the etchings. The one downside compared to RFID is that you couldn’t stand over a pile of rubble and instantly inventory the victims; you would still have to exhume them first. But I’m not sure dentists really care about that aspect of disaster recovery.