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"Writing about the future, I have a vested interest in there being a future for me to write about."
- John Brunner

Cephalic Sniffer  
  Device can locate an individual using brain patterns.  

It was easy to see how she had traced him; modern detection devices were available and cheap. Mary had probably gone to a pry-vie, a robot detection agency, obtained the use of a sniffer, presented it his cephalic pattern; it had gone to work, following him to every place he had been since leaving her. Nowadays, finding someone was an exact science.
Technovelgy from Clans of the Alphane Moon, by Philip K. Dick.
Published by Ace Books in 1964
Additional resources -

I also liked Roger Zelazny's treatment of this idea in his award-winning 1967 novel Lord of Light; see the mechanical cobra.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from Clans of the Alphane Moon
  More Ideas and Technology by Philip K. Dick
  Tech news articles related to Clans of the Alphane Moon
  Tech news articles related to works by Philip K. Dick

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