Interpol Unscrambles Doctored Photo In Manhunt

jackpot777 writes in with an AP story out of Paris reporting that Interpol has distributed photos of a man suspected of sexually exploiting children. The images were recovered from pictures taken off the Internet in which the man's face had been blurred using something like Photoshop's Filter > Distort > Twirl tool. German police were able to recover recognizable images of the man, whose identity and nationality are not known. Interpol would not discuss the techniques used to recover the images. jackpot777 writes: "It does show one interesting facet of internet privacy that has also been noted with topics ranging from reading blurred check numbers in images to Google's plan to blur out license plate and face data for Street View. And that is: blurring is not the same as completely obscuring. As computers become more adept at extrapolating data of different types, your identity isn't safe unless you completely cover all those identifying features."

Comments

Re:I bet it's made up

[geomark]

Very well could be made up. Look at how police are compensated. They get rewarded for closing cases. The focus is on arresting a suspect and getting a conviction. Whether or not it's the right person is not part of their pay package.

Re:Interpol not the ones to descramble

[edittard]

Well thanks for clearing up the confusion, Einstein.

P.S. You and your pals seem like a wild bunch. You guys really rock, I'd like to hang out with you. Which part of Germany do you live in?