Video Surveillance Identifies Threat Patterns

Ponca City, We Love You writes "When the 2008 Olympic Games kick off in Beijing next year, organizers will be using a sophisticated computer system to scan video images of city streets looking for everything from troublemakers to terrorists. The IBM system, called the Smart Surveillance System, uses analytic tools to index digital video recordings and then issue real-time alerts when certain patterns are detected. It can be used to warn security guards when someone has entered a secure area or keep track of cars coming in and out of a parking lot. The system can also search through old event data to find patterns that can be used to enable new security strategies and identify potential vulnerabilities. IBM is also developing a similar surveillance system for lower Manhattan, but has not yet begun deploying that project. "Physical security and IT security are starting to come together," says Julie Donahue, vice president of security and privacy services with IBM. "A lot of the guys I'm meeting on the IT side are just starting to get involved on the physical side.""

Comments

What we all need

[Xiph]

Ahh, finally more survaillance, and computers to monitor the cameras.

Pattern recognition to identify threats, before trouble occurs.
Soon come the day when, we can finally arrest people, before they realise that they're going to do something criminal.

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

Soon come the day when, we can finally arrest people, before they realise that they're going to do something criminal. Sounds like a cool movie plot. I think a good name for it would be The African American Report or maybe The Hispanic Report. You know, something like that.

Re:What we all need

[phantomcircuit]

Lets be real here.

The police try to find patterns in activity already, but it is far less effective for a relatively small group of people to look for patterns than it is for a computer with many cameras.

This is exactly what is already happening but faster.

When you are in public, you are in public.

Re:What we all need

[explosivejared]

issue real-time alerts when certain patterns are detected. It can be used to warn security guards

Oh come off it! This isn't Minority Report or crimethink. It's a way for security to monitor high traffic, high risk areas. It issues warning and allows security to prioritize their time and respond better to interruptions. When you're in these places, you're in public. You're not in the privacy of your own home or anything like that. You're on public streets. By going out into public you've already given up a certain amount of anonymity de facto. This is public surveillance for your protection. This is nothing more than a warning system.

Wouldn't you rather security actually be able to respond to real situations in a timely manner? Again this is for high traffic areas. There are likely to be a lot of legitimate security problems. As for me, when traveling through areas like Manhattan, I would much rather have a surveillance system like the one the article describes in place than an armed national guard member on every corner. This is a common sense application and should hopefully alleviate the problem of deploying personnel en masse, which has very obvious drawbacks.

Re:What we all need

[base3]

I would much rather have a surveillance system like the one the article describes in place than an armed national guard member on every corner.

Ah, but the "armed national guard member" doesn't have a perfect memory and because of resource limitations, can't really exist on "every corner." But an "armed national guard member" can be dispatched to round people up either in real-time or after a review of the video. I'd rather that ubiquitous surveillance be as obvious as that, so that maybe the sheep get a little outraged and the "you don't have any right to privacy" and "if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear" apologists don't end up getting the world they want.

Re:What we all need

[try_anything]

When you're in these places, you're in public. You're not in the privacy of your own home or anything like that. You're on public streets. By going out into public you've already given up a certain amount of anonymity de facto.

That makes perfect sense in the world of twenty years ago and the world we still mostly inhabit, but pervasive electronic surveillance threatens to change the meaning of statements like these. If you want to maintain the same rhetoric, make sure the words mean the same thing -- i.e., stop surveillance from de facto changing what it means to be in a public place versus a private place.

If you accept that "public place" means "a place where a detailed, permanent record of every action is captured and archived by the government," then you should rethink whether we want to have any "public places" at all. By that definition, perhaps only congressional chambers, courtrooms, jail cells, and the immediate vicinity of police officers should be public places.

Re:What we all need

[EaglemanBSA]

...and on some level, that's called profiling, and it's illegal. The grey area here is a wide one with steep, slippery slopes. I'd like to think we have the capacity to exist in a world where I don't have to be inside my home in order to not be on camera, but I think too many people mistake surveillance for safety.

Re:What we all need

[EaglemanBSA]

Just wanted to be clear, I'm well aware that this is in Beijing, and that profiling may not be illegal there (like it is where I sit). I'm simply referring to general principle, not local law.

Re:What we all need

[rhizome]

The police try to find patterns in activity already, but it is far less effective for a relatively small group of people to look for patterns than it is for a computer with many cameras.

Do you have a citation for this assertion? More generally, any information that supports your contention that computers are better than people at recognizing crime patterns in real-time. Even more generally, that computers are effective at this at all.

Re:What we all need

[RagManX]

WTF? How is profiling illegal? You have car insurance? Your rates are determined by profiling. Did you/are you/will you go to college? Admissions are based on profiling. Have you ever been asked to make a donation to some organization? You were probably selected by profiling. Have you ever taken prescription medicine? The medicine most likely to be effective for you was determined by profiling.

Yes, there are cases where profiling is illegal. But in and of itself, profiling is *not* illegal. At least, not in America. But then, I don't know where you live, so it might actually be illegal where you are.

Re:What we all need

[EaglemanBSA]

I wasn't referring to selling insurance, I was referring to being investigated/arrested for bits of data picked off automatically by a computer. Of course, profiling is useful for determining insurance premiums and whether or not you're MIT material, but when it comes to determining whether or not you've broken the law, it's a different story.

Re:What we all need

[palegray.net]

I wonder how long the video footage will be archived for. You could have a relatively small number of people go on a fishing expedition for a long time after the Olympic Games are concluded, looking for "anti-State" activities in the populace. Not that a nation like China, renowned for its human rights record, would ever do anything like that...

Re:What we all need

[explosivejared]

I agree that any surveillance should not be surreptitious and in fact should be flat out obvious. Still I think something like this is a good idea, because the national guard member on every corner can exist in high traffic urban areas like the ones this system is being utilized in. The article makes no assumption that this is going to be ubiquitous and every move you make the government will have on file. People just automatically assume this is the first step to the police state. Well we may be headed there, but this isn't the first step. This system seems to be pretty simple to me. It augments what security already does in looking for patterns.

Resources simply don't allow, right now for every move you make to be recorded and documented and a dossier kept on you and your crimethink. This isn't big brother. This isn't everywhere, it's only high risk areas. You have a right to privacy, but by going into public you waive a certain amount of that right de facto. Everyone can talk about slippery slopes all they want to, but when it comes down to it it only obfuscates matters and clouds debate. When even legitimate attempts at security that are made are called malicious, the debate is broken and only the side in power wins. If you want to protect privacy, debate security measures on their merits and not on vague philosophical grounds or through the lens of paranoia. If not you're only contributing to the problem.

Re:What we all need

[iminplaya]

Goodbye, Mr. Anderton

Re:What we all need

[apparently]

When you are in public, you are in public.

That notion can go fuck itself in public; the issue is not that black and white, and you know it. Maybe what people are proposing is, get this: we need to redefine what 'public' is. Why should my right to privacy only exist within the square footage of real estate that I can afford to rent or own? Why should my right to privacy be limited if my private acts don't cause you any harm?

Re:What we all need

[foobsr]

Even more generally, that computers are effective at this at all.

I suspect research comes under the guise " Pedestrian Detection". Add/substitute 'moving vehicle', 'target identification', associate 'Artificial Intelligence for Homeland Security', google for the profile of a 'Fei-Yue Wang' and probably identify an emergent pattern.

CC.

Re:What we all need

[BlindRobin]

the slippery slope is greased not with the application of technologies but with complacent attitudes of acceptance for incremental control.

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

Resources simply don't allow, right now for every move you make to be recorded and documented and a dossier kept on you and your crimethink. This isn't big brother. This isn't everywhere, it's only high risk areas.

Yes, that kind of technology is at least another three years away so we'll all just sit back and wait. Lets not be concerned about freedom and civil liberties until after they've been taken away from us.

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, it cant be worse than the inaccuricies of human eyewitness testimony.

Re:What we all need

[dbc001]

You make an excellent point, and I agree - going forward, we really want to limit the number of "public places" where a detailed record of all events is kept by the government. Unfortunately, the reality is that we are rapidly heading down that path. We will most likely have to devise ways of defending our privacy in those public places. The idea of limiting the number of places where detailed records of our actions are kept is a fantasy.

Re:What we all need

[badasscat]

Maybe what people are proposing is, get this: we need to redefine what 'public' is.

I think the problem is we are redefining what public is.

20 years ago, there was no expectation whatsoever that being in "public" meant your every move would be tracked by government officials potentially hundreds of miles away, and then stored for all time. That's not what "public" meant. People had an expectation that yes, anybody who was around you could potentially be watching you, but that kept it a relatively level playing field because you could pretty easily identify any threats to your privacy and avoid them if you like. If you were walking down an empty side street and needed to quickly adjust your belt because your pants were too loose, you could look around and do so without fear that cops are watching ready to jump you for "reaching for a concealed explosive" or even "intent to expose oneself in public" or whatever other nonsense law they can come up with.

That is the expectation we have always had for what "public" means - yes, you can be watched, but only by those around you, and that means that you can easily watch them back. Being able to be watched - and recorded - by someone many miles away is not what "public" means to me or anybody else. That's an intrusion, just like any other. You are being watched by people who are not there. And you have no idea what they're thinking or doing, even while they can watch your every move. It's a completely one-sided relationship where the other side has all the power. That's scary. And it's the exact opposite of what "being in public" is all about.

We don't need to redefine what public means, we need to take back its original meaning. Nobody should be allowed to watch a space that they do not own (ie. a public space) without being physically present.

Re:What we all need

[darkpixel2k]

I wasn't referring to selling insurance, I was referring to being investigated/arrested for bits of data picked off automatically by a computer. Of course, profiling is useful for determining insurance premiums and whether or not you're MIT material, but when it comes to determining whether or not you've broken the law, it's a different story.

Most warrants to arrest come from bits of data in a computer. I think what you are meaning to say is that it's illegal to arrest someone based on bullshit.

In other words, an officer may spot someone leaving a suspected drug house. You can't just throw them in jail. Although you could follow them, watch if they do something minor (like fail to use a turn signal, have a light out, etc...) and then stop them. Once they are stopped you can ask the usual questions. But in all reality, the person being stopped had every right to say fuck off--you can't search my car or person.

That's what (I'm assuming) the video system is for. Watch for suspicious activity, alert officers, and the person can be questioned. If that questioning turns up evidence of an arrestable offense, then arrest them.

And to head off a few replies, I think this video system is retarded and should not be implemented in the US using our tax dollars. Why? Everyone messes up sometimes. Say you weren't paying rapt attention to your speedometer and noticed you'd been going 5 over. Should you get a ticket every single time that accidentally happened?

The point is that if you watch someone constantly you'll eventually find them making a mistake. No one's perfect.

Re:What we all need

[robably]

When you are in public, you are in public.

When being in public entails having your every move watched and recorded and profiled, that's more like being on private property, or a prison.

This is exactly what is already happening but faster.

Beyond a certain point, making something bigger or faster or stronger in just one aspect pushes it over a line to where it becomes something very different - spin a propeller and it turns around, spin it fast enough and you suddenly have powered flight. The connection of cctv to powerful computers is not just the same as before but faster, it becomes something very intrusive and powerful. Whether you care about it or not you should be aware that a lot of other people do care, and it would be preferable if the world was not changed to make it intolerable for them to live in.

Re:What we all need

[evought]

As for me, when traveling through areas like Manhattan, I would much rather have a surveillance system like the one the article describes in place than an armed national guard member on every corner. Given the choice, I would rather have the armed guard. First, they are visible and obvious; there is a gun behind the camera just the same. Second, they actually have a chance to *interact* with people and learn about where they are working. It has a chance of becoming less of an "us-vs-them" thing as I stare at this gal's tits from the safety of my video screen and wonder about all of these "perps" walking around, and more of a "how can we work together to make this safe" thing. In an area I lived outside of DC, they started putting cops on bicycles and getting them out in the neighborhood talking to people instead of cruising around in cars: crime dropped sharply.

Given the choice, I would much rather a human standing there. Personally, I do not see the need for *either* on every street corner. There simply are not that many terrorists, and, if there were, how would you keep them out of the police?

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

...I think too many people mistake surveillance for safety. Perhaps you are right, however street camera's are about deterring certain actions in public, at least in view of the camera's.
  most cctv is only good for identifying known individuals, if your not known then your pretty much assured even if your caught on camera of getting away unless the police can get there before you and witness's have left the scene.

who you are doesn't matter, it is what you are doing that is of interest. If your cars parked up at the train station for example and someone is checking out the cars and its not a car park official you would probably hope one of the local transport police would come and investigate what that individual or group of individuals is doing.

Is that profiling or just common sense?

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

> Ahh, finally more survaillance, and computers to monitor the cameras.
>
>Pattern recognition to identify threats, before trouble occurs.
> Soon come the day when, we can finally arrest people, before they realise that they're going to do something criminal.

And on top of that, metacomputers to recognize when the camera-monitoring computers are failing to detect meta-threats, and meta-meta-computers to...

Meta^aleph-one-pattern recognition detector activated: "Government officials who advocate the transformation of free societies based on the rule of law, into surveillance societies based on datamining computers that automatically and preemtively eliminate threats" are the only real threat. All other threats are lower-order threats that wouldn't otherwise exist. Where's Colossus when we need him?

Re:What we all need

[rwyoder]

Dammit, I'd like to mod you up, but I don't have nay mod points today!!!

Re:What we all need

[houghi]

You say the fact that it is already happening as if it should be something comforting. I find it extremely disturbing that it is already happening and that now they go even one step further.

When I am in public, I do not expect that everybody is filming me and keep records of me whatever I do. I expect to have MORE privacy then why I am in a non-public place, like at work.

I am not paranoia anymore, I know that I am followed.

You OTOH are a bit TOO positive about all this and that is suspicuious, so we will keep an eye on you.

Re:What we all need

[someone300]

Interesting idea. Though I think we've always had, and still have the expectation that in public we can be observed by anyone; whether they are visible or not. The difference now is that people are fearing what the government are going to do with that information.

They say that if you're doing nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear, but everyone does something wrong (e.g. downloading music). With the surveillance nation, you could theoretically be caught for wrongdoings that you didn't even realize were wrong. Ignorance isn't a defense in law, but to know every stupid little law is impossible.

Take speeding for example. Sometimes breaking the speed limit isn't unsafe. There are some roads that have asinine speed limits, and curiously they also tend to have a speed camera. Now, you see people checking their speedo every 20 seconds to ensure they're not going over the limit. The reason they fear the speed cameras isn't because they hate being observed in public, it's because they might be prosecuted for an extremely silly reason; a reason where a police officer might have given them the benefit of the doubt in the past, or at most a warning.

As humans, we're not perfect. Occasionally we might make mistakes, not big ones, but mistakes nevertheless. Particularly given the amount of dumb laws, it's very reasonable to worry about the government having the ability to observe you wherever you are in public, even if you don't expect any form of privacy. Even if they don't prosecute everyone, it's a worry that some police officer might dislike you and use the CCTV tapes to find something to convict you on. The second worry is if people misinterpret your actions, as you mentioned "reaching for a concealed explosive" or "intent to expose oneself in public". This isn't because people worry about privacy, it's because they worry about the government and police forces misusing information.

Re:What we all need

[widman]

Well, the US Government thinks they know what we think. Thinking of crime is a crime in itself for them. Think before you think!

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, only half right. With this government and the personalities around it, just thinking suffices.

Re:What we all need

[apparently]

I absolutely agree. While there has always been a certain level of expected privacy even while being in public, there are people now claiming that there was never any such thing. So what I meant was, we need to use legislature to define that "public" doesn't mean everybody's business is completely open to everybody else. We need to reestablish and update the law to reaffirm in non-vague terms that certain aspects of one's life are private, even when out and about in public. Will people figure that out before it's too late, or does there need to be a major abuse displayed in order for it to finally be addressed?

Re:What we all need

[phantomcircuit]

You have perfectly identified the slippery slope.

Gathering evidence that would be readily available to a police officer in the same place as the camera is not profiling.

The problem occurs when people start to be harassed and/or arrested because they do not fit the normal patterns of society, which is precisely what these computer systems are determining.

Re:What we all need

[phantomcircuit]

They say that if you're doing nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear, but everyone does something wrong (e.g. downloading music). With the surveillance nation, you could theoretically be caught for wrongdoings that you didn't even realize were wrong. Ignorance isn't a defense in law, but to know every stupid little law is impossible. The solution to have "stupid little law[s]" is not the have selective enforcement but rather is to have those laws changed!

Selective enforcement of laws is a method that oppressive governments use. Very strict laws are put on the books with a non-written promise that they will only be used on the "bad guys". The problem is that the government has now given itself nearly limitless power to arrest those who it chooses.

Re:What we all need

[Torvaun]

Given the choice, I'd rather have open access to the cameras. If the material being recorded by these cameras is 'public', then let members of the public view it. We should use technology to make a level playing field. Armed guards may be more obvious, but open cameras are more useful.

Re:What we all need

[widman]

I'm thinking of reporting you right now to save myself.

Re:What we all need

[sean4u]

You are being watched by people who are not there. And you have no idea what they're thinking or doing, even while they can watch your every move. It's a completely one-sided relationship where the other side has all the power. That's pr0n!

Nobody should be allowed to watch a space that they do not own (ie. a public space) without being physically present. No pr0n? WTF are you doing on /.?

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

There are two counter-moves for that:
First, if you think it stinks, you and everybody who thinks so, keep overloading the profiling system by false positives until it is discarded as stupid, which it is.

Second, if you are a bad guy, learn how it infers conclusions and act stealthy, bellow triggering threshold, according to what you know. In fact, that second one is what bad guys do all the time, it is their bread and butter, so to say.

Obvious counter-counter step by inside-box security rigid mind "thinkers" will be to classify information on system's underlying principle of work in order to make a flawed idea (treating free-willed creatures as absolutely predictable and inanimate objects) work, which will, of course, make things worse for everybody, widening gap of distrust between government and general public.

Wash, rinse, repeat and soon we'll all be living in very real total(-itarian) dystopia.

Re:What we all need

[Talkischeap]

"The problem occurs when people start to be harassed and/or arrested because they do not fit the normal patterns of society, which is precisely what these computer systems are determining."

BINGO!

I started seriously shooting night photos about 1981, and until "911" I never got looked at twice by the police in my late night/early morning photo forays.

But since that group mind fuck day, I've been harassed by the police "just doing my job", because some room temperature IQ citizen thought I was "suspicious" with my tripod and camera.

This technology will definitely be used for citizen control, never mind the feel good "security" soft sell.

Re:What we all need

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyday more security cameras are being installed around the world. In my neighbourhood drug killings two days in a row, 2 or 3 robbiers of the same 7-Eleven within days and within 2 weeks, a bank robbery. The public see the pattern, they just don't see the police. Even after the London bombings the biggest concern was how many police to assign to the investingation because of overtime costs as read on the BBC news web site. People forget that there is a real cost of finding and chasing criminals and locking them up and the price is never a bargain and never pretty even with security cameras. The best pattern recognition I know is learned from the gypsies. Create a comotion (pattern recognition) and have others commit crimes elsewhere. Very effective globally.

Re:What we all need

[PopeRatzo]

When the 2008 Olympic Games kick off in Beijing next year, organizers will be using a sophisticated computer system to scan video images of city streets looking for everything from troublemakers to terrorists.

You know, all in all, I think I'd rather take my chances with the terrorists.

Let's be honest here: this isn't about "terrorism" at all, but about those "troublemakers". For some reason, the leaders in this world seem to think there's going to be a great increase in the number of "troublemakers" in the coming years. I don't think we can pretend any more that they are not really talking about us.

Re:What we all need

[u-235-sentinel]

Soon come the day when, we can finally arrest people, before they realise that they're going to do something criminal.

Like raise taxes?

Re:What we all need

[someone300]

Indeed. The problem is that our governments are passing these laws under the veil of anti-terrorism, but it's putting the whole of society in fear; just what the terrorists want.

Re:What we all need

[pentalive]

Inside your home you may still be on camera, if you left your drapes open.

o\\\ Be seeing you.

Re:What we all need

[pentalive]

"devise ways of defending our privacy..." Like Burkas for everyone?

I suppose...

[TheGreatHegemon]

China is a good testing ground for new surveillance tech... After all there is no illusion about there being no Big Brother. Then we're going to have it here (in Manhattan). Yup, we're still years ahead of China, aren't we?

Re:I suppose...

[krycheq]

But in China, the definition (or lack thereof) of troublemaker is what's so troubling... or maybe there's an inherent transparency in no transparency whatsoever? Being perfectly certain that there is no certainty is somewhat comforting but I don't know what's worse.

Re:I suppose...

[megaditto]

a) IBM sold a lot of punchcards machines to Nazi Germany to monitor the Jews
b) IBM sold a lot of video surveillance and face recognition hardware to China to monitor the "terrorists"

Anyone else see a pattern here?

Re:I suppose...

[zcat_NZ]

In Apple's 1984 advert, the 'big brother' image was intended to represent IBM. How prophetic ;-)

ah, yes, /this/ stuff!

[FooAtWFU]

Ah, yes, I saw a video about this at my IBM internship back about two years ago. It was all internal/NDAed then. They showed the trails of people walking into and out of buildings, and cars zooming around parking lots, and neat things like that, even with lighting changes / moving trees blowing in the wind / other environmental visual noise. My internship project's team lead wanted us to try and exploit this for our project but it, ah, wasn't going to happen, and we did much less interesting things instead.

From what I understand, though, there's a nontrivial amount of hardware involved to process the video, and though that may be less of an issue these days with better computers, I'm wondering just how many CPUs they will be throwing at how many different video cameras for this.

And I'm sure it's imperfect and prone to false alarms and such, but that's why you put human beings behind it instead of machine guns, no?

Re:ah, yes, /this/ stuff!

[Anonymous Coward]

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight...

Re:ah, yes, /this/ stuff!

[Cheesey]

I do not understand why they bother doing image recognition when most people are already carrying wireless tracking devices. Take away the need for image recognition and instead recognise people using the hardware addresses of the devices they carry, and the CPU requirements for surveillance become tiny.

Re:ah, yes, /this/ stuff!

[Yvanhoe]

And I'm sure it's imperfect and prone to false alarms and such, but that's why you put human beings behind it instead of machine guns, no? Of course, because human policemen never make errors that is why we use them.

Re:ah, yes, /this/ stuff!

[cobaltnova]

Because "most people" aren't the problem. Potential threats would quickly learn to either modify their cell phone or just turn it off.

Mod parent +5 Funny.

Re:ah, yes, /this/ stuff!

[Anonymous Coward]

are you aware that your signature above is an adaptation or misquote of a clever thing said by George Bernard Shaw/a??

Recognition logic

[LiquidCoooled]

The recognition logic is fairly simple:

if (hoodie || foreign) police.respondto(camera.location);

Re:Recognition logic

[Anonymous Coward]

no, no. Better algorithms have come about.
if(DarkSkinned || Raghead) police.arrest(camera.location);

Re:Recognition logic

[imasu]

"Police".  Hah.  As if.

More like,

if(hoodie || !white || hair.length >= stallman.hair.length)
{
    UAV.attack();
}

Re:Recognition logic

[imasu]

In all seriousness, this has the potential for racial profiling written all over it. An audit of the eventual deployed system would probably be very interesting, and equally unlikely for "security reasons".

Re:Recognition logic

[ross.w]

remember this is for the Beijing olympics...

if (Falun Gong || Human rights protestor) police.respondto(camera.location);

Re:Recognition logic

[imasu]

True in part, but it says they also want to deploy a similar system in Manhattan.

Re:Recognition logic

[Anonymous Coward]

if (1) police.respondto(camera.location);

Fixed your code for ya.

Good *old* IBM

[Anonymous Coward]

It's just like the old days, IBM looking for ways to "enhance security" and help the good old boys at the Department of Homeland Security (or, as the Germans called it, Schutzstaffel (S.S.)).

The important thing is, just like they had no idea their technology was helping make the holocaust more efficient and were just making a buck, it's completely unimaginable that the Chinese might continue to use it to crack down on dissidents afterwards.

Re:Good *old* IBM

[widman]

I beg to differ. They are well aware how this technology will be used besides the Olympics. And in my opinion, anyone working in a monstrosity like aware of the consequences is responsible too. Nobody coded this under a life threat. If people get in prision and tortured you are responsible. You-are-responsible. This work is specifically designed to impose fascism (go dig the dictionary if you don't agree.) This is evil.

Re:Good *old* IBM

[dangitman]

I beg to differ. They are well aware how this technology will be used besides the Olympics

I think you missed the point there. Did you not detect even a trace of sarcasm in the GP post? He was saying that IBM knew full well what the Nazis were going to use the technology for - just like they know today how it is going to be used in China. The whole point was that IBM was a Nazi collaborator in WWII.

Re:Good *old* IBM

[widman]

I think I tried to reply to another comment excusing the employees... Or I was too sleepy to detect the evident sarcasm :) Either way, my bad!

where's MS?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Physical security and IT security are stating to come together,"

And Microsoft's not a part of this?!?

Straight outta Metal Gear

[CyberK]

As anyone who has played Metal Gear Solid 2 knows, S3 is a baaaad thing.

Involved on the physical side?

[Enleth]

"Physical security and IT security are stating to come together," says Julie Donahue, vice president of security and privacy services with IBM. "A lot of the guys I'm meeting on the IT side are just starting to get involved on the physical side."" That sounds as if she meant that IT staff started going to the gym - surely this recent datacenter break-in would look different then, just imagine the wrestler-looking sysadmin throwing office chairs and rack servers at the thieves...

so, are there any stats

[jacquesm]

On how many real life acts-of-terroris-in-the-making have been uncovered using cameras like this ? Iirc the only use they were in London was that *after* the bombings it was still possible to see what the bombers had looked like.

Re:so, are there any stats

[explosivejared]

Did the article make a point of saying this was an anti-terror tool specifically? No, because it has a very real application. Instead of fighting whatever fantasy threats politicians throw at us, this is designed to curtail the very real problems of mugging, assault, theft, etc., that occur in high traffic urban areas.

Guys security is good. Raping the constitution, disregarding human rights, and doing a number of other unsavory things to attempt to get it isn't. However, something as common sense as this is good. This is nothing more than a mechanism for security to expand their field of vision and cut out the noise (perfectly behaving citizens) to the signal (criminals). We can all agree that some security personnel is needed in high traffic areas right? So you have two choices. One is a very inefficient system of large groups of personnel, physical checkpoints, etc. The second choice is to reduce personnel footprint based on optimization from technology and better tactics. I know which choice I would choose.

Re:so, are there any stats

[pmoses]

You can have surveillance system, but you must have person to watch screens. Cameras must see every corner. If not, people will find them. Areal cameras have problem to find difference between noise (trees, flags) and moving persons. Night vision motion detection is useless, noise level is too high. This is my experience with cameras from 2005, 2000$ each. Today we have Cell, Tilera, FPGAs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Field-programmable_gate_array at no cost, but I doubt it would be more useful than systems I know.

Re:so, are there any stats

[Anonymous Coward]

HIstory shows us that, on average, your chances of being killed by the state far outweigh your chances of being killed by criminals. This was particularly true in the 20th century and there's no reason to think it's changed recently.

It is because of this that limitations on state power are so important, and that such an immensely powerful and abuse-friendly system should not be deployed unless there are extreme safeguards placed on its use and you can prove that it will make for significant gains in fighting crime.

The video systems deployed so far have vastly increased police power while merely moving crime to areas without cameras, rather than reducing crime. So forgive me if I don't accept new installations unquestioningly the way you apparently want me to. The idea that it's "common sense" that such a system will be effective and not harmful is simply laughable.

Re:so, are there any stats

[c6gunner]

That's the only purpose of cameras in general. You don't put a security camera in a store because you think it will magically stop people from stealing - you put it in so that people who steal from you can be caught afterwards.

Re:so, are there any stats

[nbauman]

Did the article make a point of saying this was an anti-terror tool specifically? Yes.

http://www.nytimes.com/idg/IDG_002570DE00740E18002573A9007A49A5.html?ex=1354683600&en=e991061bf11b2f3e&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss/ a sophisticated computer system to scan video images of city streets looking for everything from troublemakers to terrorists.

Re:so, are there any stats

[RealGrouchy]

The primary stated purpose of surveillance cameras is to deter crime.

- RG>

Re:so, are there any stats

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

On how many real life acts-of-terroris-in-the-making have been uncovered using cameras like this?

None. Privacy groups cried foul, and no politician in any position of real power dared to try the technology. I believe there was some question of statistics, and the lack of testing in real-life situations.

Re:so, are there any stats

[PPH]

The person with the bomb strapped to themselves isn't terribly concerned with being caught afterwards.

In fact, they are relatively certain to be caught .... by a bunch of people pushing brooms around the blast scene.

Never forget

[awitod]

If it weren't for the automation provided by IBM to the Third Reich, the Nazis would not have been able to keep tabs on and slaughter so many people. http://www.ibmandtheholocaust.com/

'Do no evil.' isn't a motto IBM has, or ever will, adopt.

Re:Never forget

[awitod]

Flamebait? You must be joking. I see several others have now made the same point.

Re:Never forget

[Creepy Crawler]

So IBM's bad? Later on, IBM will be good, eh?

Hate to burst your bubble, but companies are amoral. They have one sole priority: making money for their shareholders.

If that means selling high quality computers at good prices, they will do it. That also means, if theres a need from another country to do XYZ job for gobs of money, so be it.

It is our choice of customers to choose who or who not to associate with.

Re:Never forget

[ScrewMaster]

Not really. Customers have surprising little influence on corporate behavior even when they bother to exert any.

Put it this way: publicly-held corporations (like IBM) do not operate in a power vacuum. They are a shadowy reflection of the ethical and moral standards of their shareholders, who are the only ones that have the power to tell upper management to stop doing something. As our society has increasingly begun to suffer what many term "moral decay", it's to be expected that the corporations beholden to us will behave in ways that previous generations would have found unacceptable. If the only criteria applied by the stockholder to determine the worth of a corporation is the size of the dividend, well, ethically that means pretty much anything goes as long as the checks keep getting bigger.

IBM and the N word

[anarking]

I'm sure you will all remember how the computer made for categorizing, keeping track of, and determining the fates of all those in Nazi control was in fact an IBM machine. There is a picture with the head of IBM sitting at a table with Hitler conferring on the computer design.

So now IBM is in cohorts with the militaristic China to determine people terrorists from a far-away camera through no human logic, just 0's and 1's again. And yes, the Manhattan project has been in the works for a long time, it is already underway with London's millions of cameras.

Big Brother is more than just a horrible TV show.

I just want to know when people will start learning from history.

Re:IBM and the N word

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand, it could have caught the shooter at the Westroads mall in time to intervene. Of course, if it weren't a gun-free zone, someone could have shot back, but that isn't to be.

Re:IBM and the N word

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, IBM didn't make a computer for Germany in the 1930s -- That would be about a decade before AMEs or EDSAC or ENIAC -- but IBM Germany installed and operated tons of punch-card machinery for the Third Reich.

And sadly, you have good points there. And it's all happening in the name of "safety" as that stuff always happens.

Re:IBM and the N word

[Anonymous Coward]

The more they crack down, the more people will flip out too. Leading to more cracking down, more flipping out, the War on Flipping Out...

Re:IBM and the N word

[Anonymous Coward]

Will you guys get a grip...With IBM providing the big brother apparatus to China, we get the best seat in the house. If the big brother apparatus attempts to control our demanding society then some group (horde or alliance) will go on a quest to find the guy behind the curtain and...maybe IBM should set this stuff up in Paris just so you guys can see what I mean.

I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords

[RickRussellTX]

Seriously, isn't this the kind of unbiased, behavior-based surveillance that we should be encouraging? The alternatives are (1) no surveillance in crowded, high profile events or (2) surveillance by humans with their weird biases about race, dress, headgear, etc.

No surveillance carries risk, human surveillance carries risk, and computerized surveillance carries risk. It just depends on which risks you are comfortable with.

RR

Re:I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords

[DarkOx]

Don't forget its humans deciding what "patterns" are suspect in the first place and its that the machines will be searching for, this does nothing to reduce human bias. It might even enhance it, given that a small group of people will likely be tasked with developing those patterns, as a opposed to a much larger group of independantly(or at least more so) minded security personal.

If a human gets it wrong, with some luck hopefully his partner, or commander may get it right and make a better choice. No it does not always work like, people become victims of social pressure to do bad things and make poor choices, but there is still a humanity there which at least can over come those things some of the time. That's why we have heros folks, most people are not but a person at least has the potential to be a hero, a machine does not.

Re:I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords

[Azuma Hazuki]

The problem is that surveillance, by definition, takes human beings. Cameras don't survey, they just record. All this means is that "surveillance by humans with their weird biases about race, dress, headgear, etc." gets to operate on a much larger, wider-based set of data, which means in addition to the usual bullshit that happens when people do this there'll be quotas and overwork stress.

Re:I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords

[Anonymous Coward]

What makes you think that the weird biases of human beings won't be built into the system?

The only difference, is that if they are built in, they will be applied in ALL cases.

That's efficiency for you.

Re:I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords

[pentalive]

Given people make small mistakes, some of which may break law

Would you rather have a human watch the area you are in, unable to notice every tiny detail or an infallible camera/computer system that notes every transgression regardless of severity?

I, for one, welcome our weirdly biased human law enforcement officers.

Sounds a lot like this

[DJStealth]

http://www.cse.yorku.ca/~jgryn/research/wacv_dirmaps.pdf

This is such bullshit

[nbauman]

a sophisticated computer system to scan video images of city streets looking for everything from troublemakers to terrorists. The IBM system, called the Smart Surveillance System, uses analytic tools to index digital video recordings and then issue real-time alerts when certain patterns are detected. IBM's computer scientists must be getting paid quite a bit to endure the humiliation of making claims that every knowledgeable person knows are false.
These systems have been tested before, particularly in England, where Thatcher's government paid a shitload of money that could have been used for something useful, and the only useful thing they got out of it was well-designed studies that demonstrated that these screening systems don't work.
Here in Manhattan, we had a video monitoring system set up in the labyrnthine Columbus Circle subway station for a couple of years. It also had no effect on crime. (Nor did it have any effect on the cops beating up innocent people, who happened to be black.) The City took money that could have paid for more police (hopefully honest ones) and spent it on video toys instead. Duh.
Now we're getting these digital cameras all over NYC -- even though we have good data from England, from our own pilot programs, from the Atlanta Olympics, and elsewhere, that they don't do what their promoters claim. What it demonstrates is that a huckster can sell hundreds of millions of dollars worth of useless digital junk to unscrupulous politicians accountable to a hysterical public and campaign contributors as long as it has blinking LEDs and they say the magic word "terrorism."
I challenge anyone to cite any scientific evidence, any pilot program -- not some security "expert"'s opinion -- that there are any computer "patterns" that can identify "troublemakers" or "terrorists".
Stop and think. The London suicide bombers walked on the subway with backpacks full of explosives. Innocent people go about their business on the subway all the time wearing backpacks. What pattern is there that a digital camera could spot?
The only good news in this story is that we Americans are finally ripping off the Chinese for a couple of hundred million dollars, which is good for the balance of trade. This is known in economics as the broken window fallacy.
Maybe we could sell them the Brooklyn Bridge too -- oh, wait, they already own it.

Re:This is such bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

Nor did it have any effect on the cops beating up innocent people, who happened to be black
 
yeah, because the only social injustices by cops are against blacks. you fucking racist asshole. i hope someone kicks your teeth in.

Re:This is such bullshit

[Cheesey]

I think the image recognition bit is definitely bullshit. But the data mining aspects are not. This technology is already widely used by shops to predict what people are likely to buy, and IBM is part of that business. Privacy and digital police state implications aside, why not also use it to spot unusual behaviour?

Suppose you drop the image recognition part and instead recognise people using personally identifiable information that is captured wirelessly from their mobile phones and RFID. That would give you a lot of data on each person's movements, and the system could scale to track millions of people throughout a city or country. Just add more sensors.

At this time, we just don't know how effectively the resulting data could be searched for unusual behaviour. Nothing of this scale has been done yet. But it could work, at least in principle, because all of the technology issues involved have already been solved for other problems. The remaining issue is how well you can automatically distinguish between a terrorist and a regular person when all you know about each is everywhere they have been in the last few years. Being flagged with a false positive could prove rather inconvenient.

Re:This is such bullshit

[nbauman]

At this time, we just don't know how effectively the resulting data could be searched for unusual behaviour. Nothing of this scale has been done yet. That's my point.

But it could work, at least in principle, because all of the technology issues involved have already been solved for other problems. I don't agree that it could work in principle, with any technology that we have now or in the forseeable future. What evidence do you have? I put out a call for evidence.
The one thing that otherwise-intelligent techies miss is that computer-level technology problems are easy (given a blank check). It's the other problems that are hard, such as: how do you tell whether somebody is a terrorist? How do you tell from watching him in a crowd?

The remaining issue is how well you can automatically distinguish between a terrorist and a regular person when all you know about each is everywhere they have been in the last few years. Well, yeah. That's the problem. If you discover a terrorist, do you flag everybody who lives in his apartment building, and everyone across the street, as also a suspected terrorist, as Homeland Security often does?
People say, "Oh, we'll just collect everything, put everything into a big database, and run an artificial intelligence program for a week to find correlations." But lots of times people try that and it doesn't work (especially in medicine, where as you may have noticed we haven't cured cancer yet).

Being flagged with a false positive could prove rather inconvenient. Well, yeah. There are a number of U.S. residents who were arrested, chained, taken into a prison-like confinement, not told the reason for being held, and not allowed access to a lawyer, who later turned out to be innocent of anything except having an Arabic name. There were a couple of stories about that in the New York Times Magazine. One story was called, "Who is this Franz Kafka they keep talking about?" if I remember correctly. One guy was a doctor studying radiology at M.D. Anderson. Another guy was a salesman with the name Mohammed who coincidentally happened to be using the same computer that a 9/11 hijacker had used the same day at Kinko's, and he made the mistake of signing his name in the log. And then there's David Nelson.
Once again, my point is, yes, it might work, but what evidence do you have that it will work any time during your lifetime, other than faith in technology?

Re:This is such bullshit

[Cheesey]

I think it could work because data mining works in other places, e.g. for analysing shopping patterns. Provided that you can capture the data in the first place, why isn't it possible to extend an existing model of what someone is likely to buy to cover the other things they might do?

You have much more information about each person in a crowd than a CCTV picture. You also have data about everything else they have done. That's how the hypothetical surveillance system works: it doesn't detect terrorists, it detects statistical anomalies. It uses a complete record of an individual's movements over a period of time, and all it does is spot new movements that seem unlikely because they don't fit the profile it has built up for that person. It's like a network intrusion detection system for a city: it warns a human operator when it spots something unusual so they can check it out.

Of course, no police state should be without one. It will cause inconvenience for innocent people, and arguably on that basis the project shouldn't be attempted, but that's a different question to the one of whether it could actually work (i.e. spot anomalies) or not.

Re:This is such bullshit

[MobyDisk]

This is part of a general problem where the government researches to see if something is a good idea, then deploys it without paying attention to the results. That is why we have electronic voting machines, RFID passports, and 3-ounce limits on liquids on airplane flights.

Re:This is such bullshit

[nbauman]

My question is, can you cite a published study where it's worked on applications like security? The answer is no.

Re:This is such bullshit

[nbauman]

Right. The problem as I see it is government policy-makers who either don't understand or don't care about the scientific method. Search Google for "Chris Mooney".

Mark my words

[Tablizer]

One of these days a hacker will get into such a system, find all images of people picking their nose, compile that together, and post it on youtube. At that point, then people will start thinking about the Big Brother implications.

Re:Mark my words

[moxley]

See, I always thought it would be when black bag jobs are done on people and people are arrested and sent to secret torture prisons for no just reason....But yeah, I guess boogers are the real threat here.

Obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

"A lot of the guys I'm meeting on the IT side are just starting to get involved on the physical side."

Is she really surprised about this from IT geeks?

Okay, there are just so many jokes in that line...

Jack Bauer

[Layth]

This is the kind of backup that Jack Bauer gets from CTU.

Nothing new for IBM.

[RespekMyAthorati]

Reminds me of IBM's "assistance" to the Nazis 70 years ago: IBM and the Nazis


The Nazis awarded IBM founder Thomas J. Watson the "Eagle with Star" medal, for IBM's assistance in keeping track of Jews and other "undesirables".
Watson not only accepted the medal, but traveled to Germany so that Hitler could present it in person .

Say what?

[Broken Toys]

"I was at the Kennedy School (of Government at Harvard University) a couple of weeks ago, and some guy got up and said, "If there's a security incident at the Beijing Olympics, it's going to change the course of capitalism forever," and I'm like, 'Oh man!'" Donahue said.

I don't know which part of that quote from the NYT article disturbs me more.

IBM is not the only one

[Lothar]

There is a scottish company that has been doing this sort of video analytics for years. Here is their website if you want to check it out: http://indigovision.com/

They are in fact the only supplier that has delivered fully digital IP-CCTV for Casinos in United States. Casinos tend to be quite picky when it comes to surveillance. IndigoVision also did the Olympics in Athens etc. I do not work for them, but I have lived in Scotland and are aware of their business.

The also technology similar to IBM for detecting potential treats, setting areas of interest, blocking out private areas , object detection and removal etc etc. The best part is that this can also be done in realtime in the decoder box attached to the camera which allows for direct intergration with other security systems and allows for a distributed architecture. This in addition to also having this capability at the server end using the Network Video Recorders.

Re:IBM is not the only one

[jmarpet]

Excuse me, but I have to ask if you checked your facts? The company I work for, DVTel, has many many casinos in the USA where we have 100% IP CCTV, and/or a hybrid system, with the remnants of their legacy analog system, and an IP system expanding to fill the space. I am actually traveling next week to commission another IP CCTV video security system in a casino on an Indian Reservation.

I am not a salesman, so I will not talk about our systems, but I will say that there are several companies, all over the world, offering mixed and fully digital CCTV systems.

If you have any questions, please direct them to my personal address.

Joshua
jmarpet@gmail.com

picks out all the people with "slanty eyes"

[peter303]

Irresistible racist joke here. Please forgive me.

Re:picks out all the people with "slanty eyes"

[enoz]

I think "slanty eyes" is the wrong racist stereotype for this story, you hairy-tea-towel-wearing-goathugger.

Nothing new here

[abhikhurana]

As someone who works in this industry, this is nothing new. Others have done it for years now (notice that all the companies linked here are based in different countries), but gotta love IBM for taking credit for something which they neither invented nor perfected.

Tracking Real Threats

[evought]

By definition, a slippery slope is a series of incremental steps. Your argument that this step is incremental does not figure. The problem with this system is 1) the capability to add the tracking you say is not there is simple storage, something that is cheaper every day, is simple to add and is... incremental. 2) being programmable, it is capable of being used/abused for much more than its intended purpose with little control.

But the big thing you say is that security is only being added in "high-risk" areas. Government abuses are historically *more* common than terrorist attacks, without having to invoke Elvis or aliens. We just had someone here embezzle $1.3 million over several years in the court system right under the nose of the city auditors. A recently demanded city audit shows the system is rife with abuse. Recently, a state legislator was bribed to sneak language into a bill (seven minutes before a vote) to allow a local businessman to bypass county law for a development that was denied as illegal numerous times over the last decade. Even though it is acknowledged that the bill was fraudulent, it has been signed and cannot be removed until the next legislative session--- at which point it may be too late. The CIA is currently being investigated for destroying tapes at GITMO showing evidence of torture. Our governor has created a scandal for deleting emails related to abusing his authority for political purposes (in violation of a records law he signed). In Arkansas, people have been put on death row based on evidence from autopsies which were apparently *never performed*. Where we need cameras and threat tracking is apparently on the floor of the legislature, in our courthouses, and our prisons. We need to be tracking where our politicians are going and who they meet. Somehow, I don't hear the loud cry from our representatives and "leaders" for this. Why should I give up *my* privacy, but our governor (or president) refuse to turn over emails or submit to working on camera?

They are *public* servants, and according to you, "public" affords no privacy. People do not seem to get the idea that anyone is capable of being a criminal or terrorist, including people hired to protect us from them. In Springfiled, IL, a man was recently arraigned for sex tourism and child pornography that was a cop, baptist minister, scout leader, day care volunteer, and clown with a (previously) clean record. *If* you are going to be paranoid about terrorists (I'm not), it does not make any sense to be less cautious about government power in the hands of terrorists or criminals!

The Evolution of Real ID?

[Bones3D_mac]

Ever since I first got wind of Real ID, I've been predicting a system would eventually track every citizen in the country, enter their daily activity into a central database, then use the data to rate your activity based on your averages and finally flag you as a potential threat, alerting authorities to keep an eye on you more closely.

This sounds kind of like the early stages of such a system, except that it doesn't immediately know who you are.

The face of a terrorist

[evought]

At this time, we just don't know how effectively the resulting data could be searched for unusual behaviour. Nothing of this scale has been done yet. But it could work, at least in principle, because all of the technology issues involved have already been solved for other problems. The remaining issue is how well you can automatically distinguish between a terrorist and a regular person when all you know about each is everywhere they have been in the last few years. Being flagged with a false positive could prove rather inconvenient. This is the big problem. Terrorists are actually quite rare. There is therefore very little information to input on them and most of it is likely to be statistical anomaly. There was an AI test at one point getting a piece of software to recognize images with tanks in them. They had a relatively small training set but the software did really well with it. Hit it with some real data and it got essentially random results. Why? In the test data, the photos with tanks and without tanks were shot on separate days. The "with tanks" days were cloudy. The software therefore "learned" that tanks only appeared on cloudy days.

It's the same thing with these systems. All they will detect are operator prejudices and statistical anomalies. Unfortunately, we have a diverse culture (for the moment at least...) and people are anomalous. Look at all the stupid false alarms lately. This idea is just an expensive way to automate stupid overreactions. Go team.

Impressive

[Anonymous Coward]

So Manhattan will have the same threat detector base on surveillance camera and super computer pattern matching detection AI than the largest totalitarian regime in the world known for ignoring human rights. True that thousands of very 'dangerous' people disappear every month in Chinese jails!

All thanks to a large US based giant corporation!

And we get all round up when the IP address of a "threat" (to the regime) is revealed to China in accordance to local law!

Something is terribly wrong here!

Captcha: 'protests' how fitting ;)

'Sir, alarms keep going off at St. Pats Cathedral'

[leftie]

'Stupid software keeps on locking the cameras on the cathedral, starts screaming something about Fallen Gongs, or something fall and gone, then starts tasering the Priests and Nuns when they come out!'

I have a suggestion for IBM ...

[ScrewMaster]

Video Surveillance Identifies Threat Patterns

Maybe they could save some money on expensive computer hardware and use some of those picture-sorting dogs from the next story.

Good use for the Beijing Olympics

[gamer4Life]

No doubt that many special-interest groups will want to disrupt the games to showcase their political agenda.

What a surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Coming from IBM, the company that made machines for the Nazi concentration camps.
Enough is enough, wake the hell up.

Who do they protect and serve?

[Original Replica]

"When you are in public, you are in public." should not equal "When you are public, you are presumed to have criminal intent." This is yet another symptom of the growing perceptual gap between the police and the community they are supposed to "protect and serve". There are new stories every day about the effects of the increased militarization of the civilian police forces. Some of the stories are about SWAT teams kicking in the wrong door and terrorizing and/or shooting innocent people in their own homes. http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/10/06/tennessee.shooting.02.ap/index.html http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,188934,00.html http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/1107/474003.html
Some of the stories are about police view everyone they don't like as a "badguy" and then using that to justify violence. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tOVkT2YESU&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6e2-qi0Rc3w&feature=related
And some of the stories are about police purposefully criminalizing citizens when they want to protest peacefully (another right fading away) http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/07/28/SURVEILLANCE.TMP http://www.notinourname.net/restrictions/infiltration-19feb04.htm http://www.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-0101/msg00193.html http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/22/nyregion/22police.html

Why do we want to add power to an already out of control aspect of our government? When did the police stop serving the people of the community and start serving political masters?

Pattern

[J'raxis]

IBM selling surveillance equipment to oppressive governments?

To complicated for computers to handle

[Intrinsic]

I think its a mistake to try and use a computer system to try and prevent terrorism in this way. its hard to differentiate from valid and suspicious behavior. Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

Simple Algorithm

[PPH]

Its only object regognition programmed to match any black, spherical object, approximately 12 inches in diameter with a burning piece of string protruding from the top.

China doesn't import T. Cruise?

[ruffnsc]

Why pay IBM? I mean he's got the last Precog...

NYC threats

[Anonymous Coward]

i hope they don label erratic and random driving a threaat, or else all of us idiots looking for alternate-side parking are doomed!

William Gibson already got the name

[infonography]

Sounds like a cool movie plot. I think a good name for it would be The African American Report or maybe The Hispanic Report. You know, something like that. Pattern Recognition.

which processor?

[nerdyalien]

Was it Intel Tera-scale ???

I saw one site (TGdaily as I recall) report some weeks back about similar thing done by Intel people using their terascale processor (still in testing phase). Where they played an entire foot ball match, so the tera-scale can monitor, run some algorithms and provide statistics like How many goals, tries, corner kicks etc. etc.

Dear Thug:

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a threat.

Thanks for the dictatorship.