A bill passed by the Indiana House Tuesday would ban companies from mandatory microchipping of employees. Although it seems like science fiction, the practice is growing more common in Europe and Asia.

In other countries, implanted RFID microchips are sometimes used for accessing workplace amenities like parking garages, vending machines and even computers. And although the bill wouldn’t make it illegal for Hoosiers to be voluntary microchipped, it would make it illegal to require one for work.

Rep. Alan Morrison (R-Brazil) authored the bill. He says you shouldn’t be worried. He doesn’t know of any Hoosier companies microchipping even voluntarily yet.

“At first blush it seems kind of kooky, right?” he says. “But at the end of the day, I can certainly see it as a huge invasion of privacy. So we’re just trying to be a little bit proactive on this.”

If the bill becomes law, Indiana would join a handful of states curbing employee microchipping before it starts.

Contact Justin at jhicks@wvpe.org or follow him on Twitter at @Hicks_JustinM.