Slashdot Mirror
Florida Surveillance Cameras Claim a Victim
kris_lang writes: "The St. Petersburg Times has an article that describes how an innocent man was tracked down because he was used as a "demo" face for Visionics Face-It face recognition software with their on-the-street video surveillance system in Tampa's Ybor City district. The "demo" image was printed in the St. Pete Times, and then sold to U.S. News and World Report which used it in an article. A USN&WR reader in Oklahama misidentified the face as being that of her ex-husband wanted on felony child neglect charges. The Tampa Police tracked him down to his job site and interrogated him. Now here's a question: how did they identify him in the first place to be able to track him down? Well, Florida has also been using digital photos for their newer driver's licenses. So they already have a handy-dandy database to work with."
If there's a crime halfway across the nation and then there's a match on you, do you honestly think that they're going to bother you? Of course not.
What's more likely to happen is this: Your face gets identified as a "Bad guy". The police come up to you and ask to see your ID, and say, "Somebody resembling you has committed a crime, are you willing to answer a few questions?".
Now imagine this: there is no software, they simply looked at a "Wanted" poster and saw the resemblance. Come on, get a life and stop worrying that "they're out to get you" and "my privacy will be demolished".
Oh, one more thing: quoting a bunch of authors while not spelling things correctly does NOT make you seem intelligent; it makes you seem stupid.
I wouldn't really consider the average woman from oklahoma as a member of humanity, per se.
funny munging