What was claimed
Bill Gates and the Kenyan government are implanting digital IDs in babies
Our verdict
False. The Kenyan Digital ID system does not involve implanting anything in babies.
AAP FACTCHECK – Bill Gates is not in cahoots with the Kenyan government to implant digital identification (ID) into babies, despite a claim being shared on social media.
The claim is based on a spurious news report that uses an unrelated 2015 Bill Gates interview relating to genetically modified organism (GMO) regulations and vaccines.
Posts on various social media platforms claim the government of Kenya, with the help of the Microsoft founder, wants to implant microchips containing digital IDs into babies after birth.
“I think there is something crook here,” New Zealand anti-vaccination activist and preacher Billy Te Kahika (whose claims AAP FactCheck has debunked in the past) says in a Facebook livestream from October 31 (12 minutes 45 seconds).
“Let’s talk about digital ID,” he says. “Let’s talk about what Bill Gates has got planned for you.”
As evidence for the claim, he then plays a clip from online South African Christian news channel LN24 from November 2023.
“The program targets the birth of new babies,” the reporter says. “So once you have your baby, before your baby leaves the hospital, you will no longer get a paper birth certificate, but then you get a digital one that is somehow implanted somewhere on somebody’s body.”
The reporter then introduces a snippet from a 2023 clip of Kenya’s President William Ruto talking about the digital ID system, known as “Maisha Namba”.
It is immediately followed by a clip of Mr Gates in which he says: “We’re taking things that are, you know, genetically modified organisms and we’re injecting them in little kids’ arms. We just shoot them right into the vein.”
However, the clip is unrelated to the scheme. Instead, it is from a 2015 event in Brussels where he is referring to GMO regulations and comparing it to vaccine safety testing (two minutes 18 seconds).
The Maisha Namba project was launched in 2023 and works by assigning a registration number to each citizen, normally at birth, that functions as a digital ID.
The government wants to modernise the country’s ID system, but has been held up by privacy and security concerns.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which says digital IDs are an effective tool against poverty, advised the Kenyan government on the development and rollout of Maisha Namba, according to Business Daily Africa.
AAP FactCheck has previously debunked claims about Bill Gates implanting digital ID microchips in humans.
The Verdict
False – The claim is inaccurate.
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