New System to Counter Photo and Video Devices

Incongruity writes "News.com is reporting that a team from Georgia Tech has developed and demoed a system that actively searches for and effectively blinds cameras and camcorders within a 10 meter radius." From the article: "In this system, a device bathes the region in front of it with infrared light. When an intense retroreflection indicates the presence of a digital camera lens, the device then fires a localized beam of light directly at that point. Thus, the picture gets washed out."

Comments

What about glasses ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't wait to see how many people will go blind with this contraption!

this is great

[drfrog]

now the police can give the beat downs without any fear of being caught

Am I Wrong?

[Snorpus]

... or wouldn't a portable one of these be a great way to take out all the cameras in, say, a bank?

There's still other details to work out, like the armed guards, the exploding ink in the money packets, etc., but I'm glad those Georgia engineers solved one of my problems.

Re:What about

[PitaBred]

Read the goddamn article:

How it works
The Georgia Tech system essentially exploits the "retroreflective" property of digital camera lenses. When light strikes a retroreflective surface, a portion of the light bounces back to the original source. While eyeglasses, bottles, watches and other glass surfaces are retroreflective, a coating on virtually all digital camera lenses puts cameras in a class of their own.