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11[[quoteright:240:[[Literature/NeverLetMeGo https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/259811cb2f7c25e3f925004d18d04cc0.jpg]]]]
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13Works set in the future or depicting organizations with access to advanced technology often show that people have been injected with microchips to be identified or tracked. This can show technological advancement or a lack of privacy for the protagonists.
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15In darker works, a character may not recall being "chipped" and be alarmed when he finds one in his body, raising questions about who is tracking him and how it was installed.
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17Note that chips that aren't used for tracking or identification, such as the head jacks in ''Film/TheMatrix'', don't count as examples.
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19A SubTrope of TrackingDevice. Compare BigBrotherIsWatching, RestrainingBolt, ScannableMan, TheSchizophreniaConspiracy.
20----
21!!Examples:
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23[[foldercontrol]]
24
25[[folder:Comic Books]]
26* An old issue of ''ComicBook/ThePunisher'' has the Punisher reveal that he had a tracking chip implanted into his neck, so that his sidekick Microchip would always be able to find his location.
27[[/folder]]
28
29[[folder:Film -- Live-Action]]
30* In ''Film/TwelveMonkeys'', the main character is told that he has a tracking chip in his teeth. [[TheToothHurts He removes his teeth]], but is tracked down anyway by another time traveler, who during the conversation chews him out for removing his tracker tooth and forcing his superiors to track him down the old-fashioned way from his payphone call to the answering machine.
31* Inverted in ''Film/ABeautifulMind'': The main character thinks he's been chipped as part of his being drafted into a super-secret project to defend America from nuclear devastation. He later cuts open his own arm to prove it and finds nothing, but only truly accepts he hallucinated the entire thing for decades (including a college roommate and a little girl) when he realizes none of these people ever aged.
32* ''Film/BlackWidow2021''. When Yelena Belova is sprayed with the antidote to her MindControl, the first thing she does is slice open her thigh and remove the implanted tracking chip.
33* ''Film/BladeTrinity''. The [[VampireHunter Nightstalkers]] have a satellite-linked tracking node surgically implanted in their bodies.
34-->'''Danica:''' Okay, where is this tracking node of yours?
35-->'''Hannibal:''' It's in my left ass cheek.
36-->''[Danica slaps King in the face]''
37-->'''Hannibal:''' Fine. It's in my right ass cheek.
38-->''[Danica slaps King in the face again]''
39-->'''Hannibal:''' Okay, I'm - okay, seriously now. It's in the meat of my butt, just below the Hello Kitty tattoo.
40-->''[Danica kicks King in the groin]''
41-->'''Hannibal:''' Seriously, just pull down my tighty-whities and see for yourself.
42* ''Film/CasinoRoyale2006'': After Bond runs off and does his usual RogueAgent thing, SIS implants a GPS tracker in his arm to keep track of him. Unfortunately when Bond is captured later on, the villains are smart enough to cut it out.
43* ''Film/DemolitionMan'': As part of Doctor Cocteau's master plan, almost everyone in San Angeles had an organic microchip implanted in them. Sensors around the city can determine the exact location of any of them at any time. The Scraps clearly don't have chips implanted, or Cocteau's forces would have hunted them down before the movie started. Simon Phoenix is also noted as not having a chip.
44* ''Film/JurassicWorld'': ''Indominus rex'' has been implanted with one. Unfortunately ItCanThink, remembers the device being planted, and tears it out. [[FridgeLogic How an animal, no matter how intelligent, would realize the connection between the device and the humans being able to track it]] (despite never being out of its compound) is not mentioned.
45* In ''Film/TheMatrix'', [[TheHero Neo]] is [[{{Pun}} bugged]] with a tracking bug. It is removed by [[ActionGirl Trinity]].
46* In ''Film/MissionImpossibleII'', the good guys put a chip in Ethan's head, which transmits his location to a satellite. They tell him, "This chip is completely untraceable." Which kind of defeats the purpose, when you think about it.
47* ''Film/MissionImpossibleFallout'':
48** Ethan Hunt is trying to locate a RogueAgent at a charity rave, but he has the code of the RFID tag he's using for identification and uses it to track him down. He then takes his place, but unfortunately a team of assassins is out to kill the same man, and now Ethan is wearing his tag...
49** The IMF team are forced to break RogueAgent Solomon Lane from his prison convoy. He's been implanted with a TrackingChip that they first block, then remove and place on a drone copter which is then flown off elsewhere. [[spoiler:Turns out they simultaneously planted their own TrackingChip in Solomon Lane, so they can reacquire him if he escapes, which he does.]]
50** Ethan Hunt is running across London after the villain who is wearing a TrackingChip with Benji guiding him. Unfortunately Ethan has to run up onto the roof of St Paul's Cathedral to escape some people chasing ''him'', but Benji doesn't realise this because his map isn't set on 3D. HilarityEnsues as Benji gives directions that don't match with reality.
51* ''Film/SpyKids2IslandOfLostDreams'': Carmen and Juni have dental implants containing tracking chips that somehow don't use electricity and so are the only devices they have that continue working on the island where no electronics work. They take the implants out and destroy them because they realize that they are being used to lure their parents into a trap. It doesn't work because Juni had a similar tracking device in his necklace given to him by Grandpa they didn't know about.
52* In ''Film/TotalRecall1990'', Quaid has been implanted with a tracking chip in his head which he manages to find out about and remove before the bad guys can reach him.
53** In the [[Film/TotalRecall2012 2012 remake]], the tracking device is part of a phone implanted in Quaid's hand.
54* In ''Film/TheTournament'', each of the contestants carries a tracking device, embedded under their skin, allowing the observers to monitor their movements, and the contestants to track each other. Anton Bogart manages to remove his tracking chip, dropping it in a cup of coffee just in time for Father Joseph [=MacAvoy=], a priest struggling with alcoholism and a crisis of faith, to drink it.
55[[/folder]]
56
57[[folder:Literature]]
58* In the ''Literature/ArkRoyal'' trilogy naval captains have ID chips in their palms that are needed to issue commands. [[spoiler: The Russian agents in the third book cut out Fitzwilliams' chip.]]
59* ''Literature/BruceCovillesBookOf Aliens II'': Scientists implant these in a bear in ''Hunters''. And it's heavily implied that the human kid they find, who's recently suffered from an AlienAbduction, has one implanted by the aliens.
60* ''Literature/GenocidalOrgan'': A unit of special forces ambush some soldiers in order to cut out their identity chips and gain access through a checkpoint. They then remove the chips because they're infiltrating a high-security area next, and the soldiers they killed wouldn't have access.
61* Played with in ''Literature/{{Genome}}'': most people have identification chips implanted into them, but rather than sending digital activation codes, the chips connect directly to the user's blood circulation system, look for a freshly produced leucocyte and transmit the genetic markers unique to the user to the authentication system.
62* In ''Literature/TheGirlFromTheMiraclesDistrict'', before sending Robin to work with Nikita, Irena implants him with two tracking chips -- one high-tech, one magical - so that she can keep an eye on him, and, by extension, Nikita. This being pretty par for the course for Irena, Nikita quickly has both of them located and cut out.
63* ''Literature/GreatCrystal'' series by Vladislav Krapivin had a world with ComputerizedJudicialSystem using "bio-indexes", set early on and irremovable as they saturate the whole body -- it started as a convenience, and in two generations or so ended up in outlawing anyone who remains index-less. Naturally, when a boy with otherwise inconsequential [[HealingHands healing talent]] accidentally purged himself of this thing, the bureaucracy [[RevealingCoverUp overreacts]] and HilarityEnsues.
64* In ''Literature/TheHungerGames'', all the tributes going into the Games are implanted with a tracker so that the Capitol knows where they are in the arena at all times.
65* In the ''Literature/MaximumRide'' series, [[spoiler:Max realizes that she has a microchip implanted in her arm, and that this means the lab she came from will always be able to track her. She tries to get it out herself and later has it surgically removed.]]
66* In ''Literature/NeverLetMeGo'', the students have microchips implanted in their wrists.
67* In ''Literature/OracleOfTao'', after the Council falls, money is done by implanting people with the MarkOfTheBeast, which basically amounts to an RFID tag.
68* In ''Literature/ThePlaceInsideTheStorm'', most people have biosensors implanted in their wrists that serve as ID cards. Tara keeps hers covered to avoid detection, and it ends up being destroyed when she's injured.
69[[/folder]]
70
71[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
72* ''Series/Batwoman2019'': Kate Kane captures one of Alice's men and holds him prisoner, but [[JackBauerInterrogationTechnique he nearly dies in her custody]] so she has to let him go, but [[TrickAndFollowPloy not before implanting him with a subdermal chip]]. She uses this to track down Alice and capture her, only to get LuredIntoATrap later on because [[PlayAlongPrisoner Alice knew the chip was there]].
73* ''Series/BlakesSeven''. The episode "[[Recap/BlakesSevenS3E8RumoursOfDeath Rumours of Death]]" opens with Avon captured and interrogated by a TortureTechnician called Shrinker. Avon keeps rubbing his neck until Shrinker smugly informs him that they know all about the homing device he has implanted there, which was left on so Avon's friends would be LuredIntoATrap. Avon replies that he was actually turning the device off as a signal that Shrinker had arrived on the scene. Avon's friends promptly teleport into the cell and depart with Avon and Shrinker.
74* ''Series/TheBoys2019'':
75** After kidnapping Translucent in "Cherry", the Boys have the problem of what to do about the tracking chip that all members of The Seven are implanted with. So they cover the room he's imprisoned in with RF shielding foil. Unfortunately an attempt to shoot Translucent causes the bullet to [[ImmuneToBullets ricochet off him]] and tear a hole in the foil, letting out enough of a signal to establish his location to within a few city blocks.
76** In "The Bloody Doors Off", Starlight finds herself in increasing danger from Vought Industries and Stormfront in particular, so has Frenchie cut the tracking chip out of her. Given that she too has NighInvulnerable skin this requires a diamond-tipped jeweler's saw, and leads to her boyfriend Hughie getting [[BloodSplatteredInnocents splattered with blood]]. [[RunningGag Again.]]
77* {{Subverted}} in the ''Series/{{Castle|2009}}'' episode "[[Recap/CastleS3E9CloseEncountersOfTheMurderousKind Close Encounters of the Murderous Kind]]". Castle is convinced that, given the victim died by ExplosiveDecompression, she was the victim of an AlienAbduction gone wrong, and so a metal fragment stuck up her nose must be an alien implant. Lanie, the ME, puts the kibosh on this: it turns out to be a calcification from a sinus infection that only ''looked'' like metal on the x-ray.
78-->'''Beckett:''' There you go. Logical explanation.\
79'''Castle:''' Yeah. I would disguise my tracking implant as a rare medical--\
80'''Beckett:''' ''(ignores him and moves on)''
81* In ''Series/CharlieJade'', all people in the Alphaverse have chips implanted in their arms that act as identification, an electronic wallet and a tracking devices. The plot of the series is kicked off when a women is found dead, and the autopsy reveals that she does not have a chip and never had one implanted at all. This is an impossibility in that world, so the titular detective is asked to investigate.
82* In ''Series/CrazyExGirlfriend'', [[spoiler:it is revealed that Paula has implanted GPS trackers in the shoulders of Rebecca, Valencia, Trent and probably most of the other characters. However, limited battery life somewhat limits their usefulness.]]
83* In the ''Series/CSIMiami'' episode "Legal", a victim was identified by the ID/credit chip she'd had implanted in her arm so she could go to nightclubs without a purse.
84* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E7TheLongGame The Long Game]]", set in the year 200,000, all humans have a chip implanted in them to enable their brains to work as computers. It also allows the MonsterOfTheWeek to read their mind.
85* ''Series/{{Heroes}}'':
86** The Company kidnaps evolved humans and injects them with tracking devices ("bagging and tagging").
87** In the first episode of volume 4, Hiro implants Ando with a GPS tracker.
88* ''Series/{{iCarly}}'': The TV movie ''[=iGo=] to Japan'' has Mrs. Benson reveal that she has a chip implanted in Freddie's skull, and it becomes useful when she and Spencer are trying to find the kids when they're kidnapped.
89* In ''Series/TheLastEnemy'', a government that already makes its citizens carry ID cards everywhere is plotting to upgrade to tracking chips. At least one character gets secretly chipped after attracting the government's attention.
90* ''Series/LawAndOrderSVU'' used this twice, with RFID chips that record when the person passes certain points. In one episode, a man had the ID points at his house and his friend's house and business to see if his wife was having an affair. In another, parents who'd lost their daughter adopted a ReplacementGoldfish and put the ID point at their front door so they'd know when she was coming and going.
91* In ''Series/MadeForLove'', Byron implants a microchip into Hazel's brain without her consent that, besides giving him intimate access to all her thoughts and everything she sees, makes it significantly harder for her to hide from him, since, y'know, ''he sees everything she sees'' and can easily identify her location at any given time.
92* In one episode of ''Series/{{Moonlight}}'' an exclusive club that is somehow involved with vampires requires an ID chip implant, explicitly compared to dogs, for entry.
93* ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'': In "[[Recap/TheOuterLimits1995S7E3ANewLife A New Life]]", Daniel and Beth give Father, the leader of their religious community, their newborn son William for an hour so that he can perform a private blessing. When William is returned to them, they find that he has a strange mark on the back of his neck that was not there before. Daniel later learns that Father is an alien and the mark was created by a tracking chip being implanted in William's neck.
94* ''Series/PersonOfInterest'': Team Machine goes to the morgue to examine the body of former NSA agent Alicia Corwin and finds a post-mortem cut on her shoulder where something was removed; a tracking chip implanted by a private intelligence agency.
95* TheSeventies version from ''Series/TheProfessionals'' episode "Need to Know". The KGB snatch a DoubleAgent from a VulnerableConvoy [[spoiler:but Cowley reveals he's a FakeDefector who has been implanted with a 'pin' in his elbow months before that's actually a transmitter.]]
96* In the ''Series/RedDwarf'' episode "Epideme", Kryten uses a scanning device to identify the dead body of a former JMC employee. He mentions that it is seeking her microchip, since JMC employees are implanted with them.
97* ''Series/{{Taken}}'': In "High Hopes", doctors discover that Russell and Jesse Keys both have inoperable tumors in their frontal lobes. They turn out to be implants placed in their brains by the aliens. Dr. Kreutz determines that they are tracking devices. Dr. Wakeman identifies the energy signature that each one emits in "Maintenance" and figures out how to track the implants as the aliens do in "Charlie and Lisa".
98* ''Series/Titans2018'': When Dick Grayson is told that Batman implanted a subdermal tracker on him without his knowledge, he cuts it out with a surgical scalpel. In a later episode, Jason Todd states that Dick has a second tracker "where you'll never find it." Hank and Dawn both go [[TooMuchInformation "Eew!"]]
99* ''Series/TheXFiles'': In the third season episode "[[Recap/TheXFilesS03E01TheBlessingWay The Blessing Way]]", Scully discovers a computer chip implanted in her neck. In later episodes, she tries to find out what it does.
100[[/folder]]
101
102[[folder:Podcasts]]
103* In ''Podcast/EdictZeroFis'', the Remote Mission Oversight System (RMOS) includes implants to track the location, status, and vitals of agents in the field. A similar system is used with patients in Harlan Hills Sanitarium.
104[[/folder]]
105
106[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
107* ''TabletopGame/{{Crimestrikers}}'' has the Bio Beacon, a device surgically implanted in each team member's brainstem. It also functions as an InUniverse LifeMeter, monitoring the health of each agent as well as their location.
108* In the ''[[TabletopGame/D20Modern d20 Modern]]'' science fiction sourcebook ''d20 Future'', characters can acquire subcutaneous "shepherd chips" as a form of permanent identification, useful for easily trading contact information with other shepherd chip-users as a sort of digital business card. Sinister implications are left unmentioned, but given the name, any halfway creative GameMaster could run with it in an instant.
109* In ''TabletopGame/HcSvntDracones'' most people store their personal data in cloud servers accessed by placing a quarter-sized "Toggle" on a smartglass surface. For just 50 credits a Toggle can be implanted in your palm.
110* Anything and anyone in ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'' can have a tracking RFID chip, so tag erasers are a very common piece of gear amongst runners. The signature characters relate tales of how a single errant RFID chip can compromise a mission and make it a point to blast everything and everyone they acquire with a tag eraser.
111[[/folder]]
112
113[[folder:Video Games]]
114* Some of the findable clues to the history of Laurentia in ''VideoGame/NexusClash'' describe a citywide backlash against immigrants who arrived as part of a world-spanning refugee crisis. One of the hints that something is amiss is a description of immigrant laborers being implanted with tracking chips in order to get jobs outside of the ghetto that they'd been relegated to.
115* In ''VideoGame/QuakeIV'':
116-->'''Marine''': Hannibal! I need a medic!\
117'''Medic''': Who are you? I'm not able to get a reading on your medchip.\
118'''Marine''': Corporal Thomas Alvarez. My medchip is damaged.\
119'''Medic''': But your medchip's implanted in your heart!\
120'''Marine''': I know... [[MajorInjuryUnderreaction I'm looking at it right now.]]
121* In ''VideoGame/TheSecretWorld'', new Illuminati recruits are all fitted with microchips at the base of their spine so that the Illuminati can keep tabs on them. [[spoiler: This becomes a plot point when you have to track down a rogue agent; later in the quest, he turns up dead courtesy of a horde of angry mummies, so you've got to retrieve his chip.]]
122** Issue #7 reveals that the [[MegaCorp Orochi Group]]'s test subjects are implanted with tracking chips to ensure that they can be easily found and recaptured in the event of a breakout. This comes in very handy when you have to rescue two children who've just escaped from an Orochi facility, though it does require you to purloin the necessary tracking equipment in order to follow the signal. [[spoiler: Unfortunately, the trail ends with no sign of the children, for ''something'' has torn both microchips out of the test subjects and left them floating in a sizeable pool of blood.]]
123* In ''VideoGame/XCOM2'', citizens of the [[VichyEarth ADVENT Administration]]'s glittering city centers want for little, and receive free housing, comfortable jobs, access to [[CureForCancer gene therapy clinics]], and enjoy [[ImpossiblyDeliciousFood delicious ADVENT Burgers.]] The price for admission is an implanted biochip required to navigate the city centers' [[GildedCage multiple layers of security]], from patrols of [[FacelessGoons transhuman "peacekeepers"]] to [[BigBrotherIsWatching automated scanners.]] XCOM's current head scientist got so fed up with it that he [[SelfSurgery extracted his own biochip]] and went rogue.
124[[/folder]]
125
126[[folder:Webcomics]]
127* This is joked about from time to time in ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'', with Riff saying he's put a chip in Torg's head. A Dorito.
128[[/folder]]
129
130[[folder:Web Original]]
131* The Website/SCPFoundation implants these in many of its captive anomalies, particularly those which have a history of escape attempts.
132[[/folder]]
133
134[[folder:Western Animation]]
135* In ''WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfJimmyNeutronBoyGenius'', Jimmy's mother put one of these in Jimmy's father, just in case.
136-->'''Hugh Neutron:''' Darn thing ''still'' itches.
137* ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'': In "100 A.D.", Stan reveals that he put chips in Steve and Hayley's skulls and paid extra for Hayley's tracking beacon to turn purple if her body temperature rises, such as during sex, and the ability to make her breasts explode.
138* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'': In a ChristmasEpisode, after Lois snaps and goes on a rampage, Peter mentions that he put a homing device in her skull for such an occasion and uses a laptop to detect her location. Several dots appear on the screen, and Peter realizes he also put some in some squirrels.
139* In the pilot episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'', everyone has a chip implanted with the information on the job for which he is best suited. It isn't brought up again until the third season and never mentioned after that.
140* ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'': There are scattered references to [[MissionControl Wade]] secretly tagging Ron with a tracking chip.
141* In ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "The Boy Who Knew Too Much" (S5 E20), after Bart skips school, Principal Skinner tries to track him using a chip system they tried to implement. He then bemoans the fact that the only kids who volunteered to be chipped were the studious nerds, who don't need to be tracked.
142* In the ''WesternAnimation/TrollsTheBeatGoesOn'' episode "Apple of My Ire", while disarming the pranks that he put in Branch's bunker, Cloud Guy reveals that he also put a tracking device in Branch's mouth while he was sleeping.
143[[/folder]]
144
145[[folder:Real Life]]
146* In May 1998, Kevin Warwick [[http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.02/warwick.html implanted an RFID tag beneath his skin]] and used it to control lights, doors, etc. Several hobbyists have followed, such as [[http://jon.oxer.com.au/blog/id/86 Australian software developer Jonathan Oxer]].
147* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PositiveID PositiveID]]
148* Civil rights issues covered at [[http://www.spychips.com spychips.com]]
149* Implanted RFID chips/tags are often used for identifying pets, livestock, or highly endangered animals since they are unobtrusive and unlikely to fall off or break like collars or bands can.
150** Naturalists often ''have'' to use these to monitor wildlife movements when external trackers aren't an option, such as with aquatic mammals that could drown if a collar caught on underwater debris, or snakes which have nowhere to attach a harness.
151* Some nightclubs offer RFID chip implants to [=VIPs=], who use them to add drinks to their tab.
152* A fairly popular conspiracy theory links the possible widespread implementation of RFID implants to the NumberOfTheBeast. Which, along with more mundane concerns about abuse by authoritarian governments, has largely prevented this trope from appearing much in real life.
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154[[/folder]]

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