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UK School Introduces Facial Recognition

Posted by timothy on from the excuse-me-while-I-register-my-delight dept.

Penguin_me writes "A UK school has quietly introduced new facial recognition systems for registering students in and out of school: 'HIGH-TECH facial recognition technology has swept aside the old-fashioned signing of the register at a school. Sixth-formers will now have their faces scanned as they arrive in the morning at the City of Ely Community College. It is one of the first schools in the UK to trial the new technology with its students. Face Register uses the latest high-tech gadgets to register students in and out of school in just 1.5 seconds.'"

42 of 214 comments (clear)

  1. Wearing a berka sounds like a good idea, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    don't you think?

    1. Re:Wearing a berka sounds like a good idea, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      How about a Guy Fawkes mask?

    2. Re:Wearing a berka sounds like a good idea, by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Wearing a berka sounds like a good idea, don't you think?

      You make a good point.

      This "school"... it has high-tech security, guards, biometrics, no one learns much there and they call it an "institution".

      What makes it different from a prison?

      You know there's a huge push on to try to get kids into elderly care? They'll throw money at em, pay for their school, pay em a salary to go, and yet, the kids don't want to have anything to do with it. It's a real crisis, cause there's not enough kids to wipe all the elderly assholes' assholes, so to speak. Final result of all this womb-poison being shoved down peoples throats, I guess.

      I told my folks and their friends this was going to happen when I was 17, and that it was inevitable that we would abandon our parents generation to die without care because there weren't enough of my generation. Man you want to see some pissed off people with a sense of entitlement.

      But I'm starting to think maybe I was wrong. With shit like this being done to children by their own parents in their own nation, abandonment seems a little too turn-the-other-cheek to be realistic. The way things are going, demand for retribution and revenge seems inevitable...

      --
      -1 Uncomfortable Truth
  2. I wonder how it copes with twins? by adnonsense · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Or just someone holding up someone else's photo?

    1. Re:I wonder how it copes with twins? by Big+Hairy+Ian · · Score: 4, Informative

      RTFA it scans the face using infra red. You are right about twins though also how will it cope with beards/Mustaches/Sun glasses. Not such an issue at a 6th form college I know plus this a voluntary system which I'm sure the students support because it saves them about 40 mins a day sitting their whilst a teacher goes through the register.

      --

      Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.

    2. Re:I wonder how it copes with twins? by sakdoctor · · Score: 4, Funny

      This absolutely sucks. In my day, all we had to do to sneak out of class, was wait for teacher to turn their back.

      Now days kids have to wear Thermoptic Camouflage armour. What is the world coming to.

    3. Re:I wonder how it copes with twins? by Ashriel · · Score: 2, Informative

      Most facial recognition systems can determine the difference between identical twins - there are small differences, y'know.

      Actually, if you pay attention, you should be able to tell one twin from another yourself, assuming you know a pair. I've known a few, and I've always been able to tell the difference. One dead giveaway is when one twin has a slightly slimmer face than the other.

    4. Re:I wonder how it copes with twins? by amias · · Score: 2, Interesting

      i wonder how it copes with the catastrophic outbursts of acne and spots that afflict
      people in the 6th form college.

      It would be serious embarrassing to have to
      be scanned again and again because of your
      spots.

      --
      [site]
    5. Re:I wonder how it copes with twins? by CrimsonScythe · · Score: 5, Funny

      Twins? Easy! The evil twin always has a goatee.

      --
      The view was horrible and the smell was even worse; Julie severely regretted becoming a proctologist.
    6. Re:I wonder how it copes with twins? by mdwh2 · · Score: 3, Informative

      In my sixth form, I don't think anyone bothered turning up for registration :) The teachers didn't care. It's not like this is compulsory school, if you don't turn up it's your loss, not theirs. (US readers may not be aware - 16-18 is optional in the UK, and my experience was that they treat you much more like an adult student at University, rather than still a school kid who has to follow rules. Although some colleges may be stricter than others.)

  3. Why do this? by __aashqr1992 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Why do this? What possible advantage is there? It seems like a completely gratuitous database. Besides which, when I was at college (in the UK age 16-18 normally) they didn't take register - If you didn't turn up, that was your own problem; the lecturers took it up with you when you finally did turn up for class.

    1. Re:Why do this? by SlashSlasher · · Score: 2, Funny

      Now the police will have a full biometric database of the entire population. They used to have to make up a baseless accusation to add you to their database and take your DNA. That's very useful when you run your country like a supermax prison. London has more camera surveillance than most of the prisons in my country. If they wrap George Orwell's corpse in wire they can power the whole thing by how fast he's spinning in his grave. To everyone who thought I was a paranoid freak: I'll take that apology now.

    2. Re:Why do this? by montyzooooma · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Besides which, when I was at college (in the UK age 16-18 normally) they didn't take register - If you didn't turn up, that was your own problem; the lecturers took it up with you when you finally did turn up for class.

      Except when you get hit by a bus the college then gets into trouble for not knowing where you are when you're supposed to be under their care. We're a nanny state, remember.

    3. Re:Why do this? by Xest · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Same reason they're making DNA databases of kids, fingerprint databases of kids and so on.

      Because most head teachers are power hungry muppets with not a single bit of respect for liberty in their blood.

      It's no suprise then that Jacqui Smith was a teacher before coming totalitarian dictator in chief for the Labour party reporting only to comrade Brown and torture master Milliband.

      I don't know what the deal is but so many people in the teaching profession in the UK seem to have this power hungry attitude. I don't know if it's years of being in charge of and having power over kids that oddly in their own minds gives them the same feeling as other corrupt dictators running countries over the years or what.

      Seriously though there's a bigger point to be made here, regarding this sort of thing and the DNA/fingerprint databases of kids as well as swipe cards and that sort of thing that schools implement and the government supports. I'm concerned the Labour government is pushing and supporting this kind of thing on kids because they can do it at school where many parents are oblivious to it and such that kids become used to it and wont be opposed to it as they grow up because it's all they've ever known. Coupling parental ignorance with "It's to protect your children" seems like Labour are trying damn hard to make the next generation of voters assume it's normal to suffer this kind of surveillance.

    4. Re:Why do this? by digitig · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Age 16-18 you are not "under their care". At 16 in the UK you are old enough to marry (with your parents permission; not needed in Scotland), leave school and set up your own home or join up with the military. You're considered enough of an adult to look after yourself (though not enough of an adult to go and see a film showing stuff that you're pretty much expected to be doing if you're married. Err...)

      --
      Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
    5. Re:Why do this? by Xest · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've been to schools where ID cards have been used for toilet access and to monitor where kids are in the school with the aim of making sure kids aren't spending too long in the toilets avoiding lessons or to make sure they're not elsewhere in the school they shouldn't be.

      How well does your monitoring work? The schools I covered were all attached to the Yorkshire and Humberside Grid for Learning which is effectively an ISP for all schools connected in that region. They offered filtering which was pretty ineffective because it'd take 24hrs or more to get a site blacklisted. Some schools used their own filtering solutions on top, usually Censornet. There was certainly no problem kids getting round most censorship regardless but certainly many teachers getting wound up about it when the end result of the kids getting where they wanted anyway had questionable negative effect regardless.

      The problem is that as with the real world and CCTV cameras, monitoring to stop bullying and such merely just moves the problem elsewhere. It doesn't deal with the core issue, it just hides it away better.

      I wouldn't argue kids should have the right to view porn, they should certainly be taught it's not accepted behaviour to browse stuff in public places, but I would question what the actual problem is if they do look at that kind of thing. I mean, how many kids have mobile phones now anyway that can access the internet and browse stuff like that if they really want to? Monitoring seems like a futile band aid that just hides the problem. It does have the side effect of discouraging people from using the internet in case they run into something that may get them in trouble. A lot of kids also just used proxy sites to bypass filtering, if required, using another kids password or even in the odd case, getting hold of the teacher's.

      Of course, you can blacklist everything and whitelist what is required but again this just ruins the internet for the kids, there'll be little point to it for the most part. Even Wikipedia has content people might not want kids seeing and you either go through trying to block every questionable page or you let them have full access. You then do that for every site you allow.

  4. Why? by houghi · · Score: 2, Interesting

    When I was in school, many moons ago, the teacher just wrote up who was there and who wasn't. Is Johnny in class? No? Report it. No matter if he was in school roaming the halls. Why solve a social problem with a technical solution?

    The bad thing is that these are the people who should teach your children.

    --
    Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
    1. Re:Why? by rarity · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why solve a social problem with a technical solution?

      You're misapprehending the problem. If the problem was "how do we know who's in class?", then there's nothing wrong with the simple signing of the register. The problem that this is designed to solve, though, is "how do we collect facial-recognition data on as many people as we can while they're still to young to do anything about it?"

    2. Re:Why? by rarity · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That is the real question. So how long before the UK is a Totalitarian State?

      What do you mean, "before"?

  5. Bloody idiots by ledow · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I work in schools, in the UK, in IT. This is just incredibly stupid.

    You are now RELIANT on that system being accurate to safely evacuate the building in an emergency. That automated system is NO GOOD for that purpose - and you're relying on it with little to no manual backup. You WILL get students with photocopies of their friend's faces (and/or other similarly low-tech solutions to allow the automated system to recognise and register them) in order to get out of lessons, lectures, etc. that they are made to attend. Then when you have a fire, and they are actually somewhere else (or vice versa, logged out of the system but actually still on the premises) you are going to put people's lives at risk. Seriously, give me a week, and I could probably find a way around it that a sixth-former could manage.

    Not only that, you are opening yourself up to enormous DPA issues, because this is a irrevocable biometric - much like the UK government and education in general currently condemns and advises against fingerprint recognition systems in schools. It's also completely unnecessary, extremely expensive, probably quite unreliable (any identical twins go to that college, or even just two people who look alike?), potentially discriminatory (What if someone's face isn't recognised? What if they have disfigurement? What if they deliberately obscure their face or object to the system? Do you allow a bypass to that system for them?). The cost of implementing and *maintaining* and *renewing* that system probably far outweighs an hour or so a day at minimum wage for a member of admin/support staff who has some free time, before you even consider the future problems you've opened yourself up to.

    Tell me... did the head of the school come up with this idea? I very much doubt it was the staff who were handling the registration systems in the first place.

    1. Re:Bloody idiots by peterprior · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Not only that - but who has the time to "quickly and effectively print data off from the system showing who was on site" when there is a bloody fire alarm. When I was in school we were told to leave everything and get out, not wait for a laser printer to warm up or an epson stylus to clean its printer cartridges.

    2. Re:Bloody idiots by ledow · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Agreed, in part. It's just a dumb idea.

      However, that system is undoubtedly NOT under the control of the IT department, or only minimally via their contractors, when it should be - nobody else really deals with the policy regarding DPA issues except for the IT department and possibly a Data Manager in the larger schools. Unfortunately, it will also tie into their IT registration systems. In doing so, they've given no thought to maintenance or integration costs, whether it satisfies the requirements of such a system, potential interactions (how quickly do "expelled" students get removed from the database, or new students get added?), etc. It's based heavily on similar IT that I have supported (card-swipe registration) where the same problems came up and nobody cared - you even had kids stealing staff cards in order to get into the school at lunchtime because it could take a week to get them cancelled. Each card cost a LOT of money to print and it's a certainty that this system is only slightly undercutting their nearest rival systems (cardswipe reg system) in order to make most profit - for a job that takes FIVE MINUTES for a good teacher and is actually quicker done on a bit of paper. Yes, even some modern schools with thousands of pupils are still using "old-fashioned" registers. And bloody right, as well.

      And I have to second the comments made by others on school procurement processes in the UK... I have to say that I *have* worked in places in the past where things were bought purely on the basis that the head was sweet-talked without consulting staff, or where the head was actually a family member / golf buddy / old army colleague of the supplier, as were all the governors (or they were suitably ejected, or otherwise not part of the decision-making process). I've seen IT companies, just like this, with "new" products which were set up entirely on the basis of selling to a handful of schools under the control of a single person, only to disappear shortly after delivery of shoddy, inadequate products with falsely-stated claims and zero other previous clients. Some of them even get as far as BETT...

    3. Re:Bloody idiots by ZeroExistenZ · · Score: 3, Funny

      what happens if THE SYSTEM is the cause of the fire? Hence, you have no records and can't gather any?

      You're thinking too localized. For missioncritical systems, you'd use an offsite datacenter with a decent SLA-contact. It's up to the datacenter to take the precautions to not have their servers go up in flames (that's why some of these datacenters are bunkered and have high security) and preferably have a redundant setup, spread over more then 1 location which is easy these days with virtualization.

      --
      I think we can keep recursing like this until someone returns 1
    4. Re:Bloody idiots by ZeroExistenZ · · Score: 2, Funny

      You'd still need to get the data back to the site.

      That should be no problem, there are alot of options.

      What if at the datacenter, nodoby is reachable

      Pay nodoby a bit more to be present or pick a good datacenter, there should be at least one person physically at the datacenter and a few on call to make sure they can meet their SLA's.

      or what if all faxes and phones of the school (needed to receive the list back from the datacenter) are submerged in water too?

      When I drive to work I browse the web on my cellphone and check my email, even email. (texting and phoning is bad and dangerous!)
      In this day and age, nearly everybody has a cellphone. Why not setup a PBX too on the datacenter with a female voice so you can run down the list? Or a SMS portal: "text class2bstudents to 555-555 for a list of present students. It's easy to hook up. You could also train a pigeon, put it in a glass windowed box with a hammer and the text "break glass in case of *icon of a burning computer* *icon of a floating computer* *icon of someone throwing around computer* *icon of someone shooting a computer* *icon of teens screaming and running around in panic* *black icon indicating power outage* So in the case of such an emergency, you will have the pigeon fly to the datacenter, performing a pre-trained task to have another pigeon print out a list by the push of a button, and then subsequently presses a button preparing another pigeon (with a little conveyor belt) with the printout and releasing it (catapult launching mechanism) to fly back...

      The possibilities are endless, to each problem there is a solution... I'm a consultant btw, you could hire me for all your technical problemsolving and projectmanagement. Currently we are training dolphins (after a proof of concept, we went away of the idea to use sharks after overseeing some variables), in case of a ship sinking, unable to send an emergency signal, the challenge here is still to have the dolphins walk to the datacenter once they reach a shore.

      --
      I think we can keep recursing like this until someone returns 1
  6. For the watchful... by yibble · · Score: 2, Informative

    Great, so we now have a picture of the student demoing the machine, and her PIN (6447). What did we learn today?

    1. Re:For the watchful... by AHuxley · · Score: 2, Funny

      .NET, C# and silverlight.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  7. Brilliant! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    "UK School Introduces Facial Recognition"

    This is very good progress. It is important to keep up with the development of various sexual perversions in our modern fast-paced society. Therefore, recognizing facials as a new part of the curriculum of sexual education in schools is a good thing, even if only in one school in the UK for now. But it is a start, and hopefully facials are recognized soon in every school. It is about time to introduce the recognition of facials!

  8. CCTV in schools by jez9999 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    There are also reports of schools installing CCTV cameras in UK classrooms to monitor both teachers and pupils. Very depressing stuff, that this is even considered, let alone allowed to go on.

    All I can say is, I'm glad I went to school 10+ years ago. I wouldn't want to learn in such an invasive environment. It's disgusting, and those who think it's appropriate should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

    --
    == Jez ==
    Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
    1. Re:CCTV in schools by BSAtHome · · Score: 3, Interesting

      And there is no money to renovate the buildings or hire more/better qualified personnel. But, there is money for tech to watch^H^H^H^H^Hspy. Says something about the priorities nowadays...

  9. Misleading summary (shock!) by NoNeeeed · · Score: 4, Interesting

    "A UK school has quietly introduced..."

    If by "quietly" you mean, "telling everyone about how good it is and getting it in the press" then yes I guess so. Ahem. Did the submitter actually read the article they submitted?

    It's worth RTFA and watching the short little video to see what the system does (I know, this is /. etc).

    This is not some Big Brother style camera system covertly watching the students. This is a box on the wall which the students have to actively use to sign themselves in and out. They have to actively press buttons (well a touch screen) to use it.

    While I am nervous about using biometrics for this sort of thing, the data being collected is exactly the same as would be recorded by the class register, the only difference is that it uses a computer rather than a teacher. Some schools have been using swipe-card systems for a few years, this is just a step up technologically.

    There is a wider argument about the way schools are run, and the creeping use of biometrics, but this is primarily used to see who is in the building if there is a fire, so I'm not really sure that the "OMG, BIG BROTHER!1!!!!1!!" spin is warranted.

    Especially since they have not exactly kept it quiet.

    --
    Paul Leader
    1. Re:Misleading summary (shock!) by Plunky · · Score: 2, Informative

      If by "quietly" you mean, "telling everyone about how good it is and getting it in the press" then yes I guess so. Ahem. Did the submitter actually read the article they submitted?

      There is a difference between 'quietly introduced' and 'announced its launch'

      You can scheme quietly to make something happen that you know will be controversial, then implement it and announce the fait accompli. The amount of objections to cause a deinstallation will be vastly more than the amount of objections needed to prevent its installation in the first place.

    2. Re:Misleading summary (shock!) by houghi · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "Quietly introduced" means without consultation before the introduction. It was the introduction that went quietly. Learned that in a school without this stuff and English isn't even my first or second language.

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  10. What problem, exactly, is solved by this? by jonaskoelker · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sixth-formers will now have their faces scanned as they arrive in the morning at the City of Ely Community College. Face Register uses the latest high-tech gadgets to register students in and out of school in just 1.5 seconds.

    Erm... what problem is being solved by this?

    If you want to know whether the kids are in class, as opposed to in school, you have to look in every classroom. Except that it doesn't really work; you have to look where the students are supposed to be, which the system may not know (or be able to adapt to).

    Is it fire safety and evacuation? So you have one of these machines at every exit, and it can perfectly well identify everyone in a screaming running horde of people?

    It doesn't seem to solve any useful problem. Does anyone know what it's intended to accomplish, and whether it actually accomplishes anything?

  11. Fire in the server room. by Martin_Stevens · · Score: 2, Informative

    "Only today (Thursday, 05 March) we had a fire alarm test and the administration staff were able to quickly and effectively print data off from the system showing who was on site." You gotta say it's lucky that there wasn't a fire in the server room. I can just imagine getting a tech support call during a fire saying "my printers not working"

  12. Re:Yet another kettle of worms opened... by expat.iain · · Score: 2, Funny

    ... Muslim head scarves / veils, anyone?

    Not for me, thanks. They don't match with my complexion.

  13. Well, I guess face recognition isn't AI anymore... by javilon · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...Every time AI researches find a working algorithm for something that the human mind does, the ability coded on that algorithm stops being thought of as "Intelligence" and becomes "just a calculation that any computer can do".

    So I guess pattern recognition in images is not AI anymore, right?

    --


    When his defense asked, "Which computer has Jon Johansen trespassed upon?" the answer was: "His own."
  14. 1.5 seconds.. how many millions did this cost? by plasmacutter · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I can sign my name in 1.5 seconds, and type it even faster.

    I can depress my thumb onto a (now 2 decade old) biometric reader for the same result in the same amount of time.

    This is an excellent example of stupidly wasted money.

    Heck, even if its tied to stimulus spending, the new deal wasn't just about putting people to work, but putting people to work building infrastructure which would improve the efficiency and cut the costs to businesses in the long term.

    This does not do either.

    If it's not tied to stimulus spending this school should be chastised for buying this expensive system in a time when a few more jobs would be more valuable to the community.

    --
    VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
  15. You guys are missing the point... by denzacar · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It is ONE school. How useful could data from only one school in the entire UK be for a forming of some BigBrotherTM database?

    Nah... It's something much simpler.
    Same reason the face-recognition companies practically gave away their hardware to selected locations in India so they could get better at recognizing the "darker" faces.

    Fine tuning.

    Teenagers have a tendency for two things more than any other age group.
    Growing up and changing their facial structure very quickly in a matter of months AND they "play" with their faces more than anyone else.
    Makeup and cosmetics for girls, facial hair for boys, piercings etc. for both.

    The point of this "experiment" is to teach the machines how to successfully identify people even if they change their hairstyle, hair color, eye color, grow a beard or a mustache, do some light plastic surgery or heavy makeup to alter their faces, etc.

    Now, when they put this in every school - THAT is for making the Great Britain's Good Citizens Glorious Database or GBGCGD.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
    1. Re:You guys are missing the point... by diskis · · Score: 5, Insightful

      >It is ONE school.

      It's the FIRST school.

    2. Re:You guys are missing the point... by sootman · · Score: 3, Informative

      I'd like to take this opportunity to point out that Cory Doctorow's awesome book Little Brother is a great read and can be downloaded for free from the author's site.

      The first order of business were those pesky gait-recognition cameras. Like I said, they'd started out as face-recognition cameras, but those had been ruled unconstitutional. As far as I know, no court has yet determined whether these gait-cams are any more legal, but until they do, we're stuck with them...

      Your personal, inch-by-inch walk is yours and yours alone. The problem is your inch-by-inch walk changes based on how tired you are, what the floor is made of, whether you pulled your ankle playing basketball, and whether you've changed your shoes lately. So the system kind of fuzzes-out your profile, looking for people who walk kind of like you.

      There are a lot of people who walk kind of like you. What's more, it's easy not to walk kind of like you -- just take one shoe off. Of course, you'll always walk like you-with-one-shoe-off in that case, so the cameras will eventually figure out that it's still you. Which is why I prefer to inject a little randomness into my attacks on gait-recognition: I put a handful of gravel into each shoe. Cheap and effective, and no two steps are the same. Plus you get a great reflexology foot massage in the process (I kid. Reflexology is about as scientifically useful as gait-recognition).

      --
      Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
  16. Re:they're surveilling the teachers too by ledow · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You certainly couldn't - I worked in another school in Essex that does exactly the same. I assure you it is not only real, but *nobody* in the school understands the problem with it except the bad teachers who accept it but get tetchy that their bad teaching is being recorded... not the fact that they are bad teachers, or that they/the staff/the students are being recorded - but the fact that they might have thier gravy-train ended.

    I was asked to design and build systems to do just this too, because I could CCTV up a room cheaper than their suppliers. I built one to cover the ICT office which *we* turned on and off overnight or during the holidays to help spot where our laptops were disappearing to, and had no further part in anything else. Not only does it exist - it is happening, it is accepted and it's not being questioned by ANYONE, staff, students, parents, heads, local authorities, etc. even when they are made aware of it. That's more scary than merely "it's possible" or "it exists".

  17. So, what you are REALLY saying is... by denzacar · · Score: 2, Insightful

    You WILL get students with photocopies of their friend's faces (and/or other similarly low-tech solutions to allow the automated system to recognise and register them) in order to get out of lessons, lectures, etc. that they are made to attend.

    (any identical twins go to that college, or even just two people who look alike?), potentially discriminatory (What if someone's face isn't recognised? What if they have disfigurement? What if they deliberately obscure their face or object to the system? Do you allow a bypass to that system for them?).

    ... that it is a great testbed for determining the flaws of the system and fine-tune it against deliberate ways of obscuring one's face or missidentification due to either deliberate attempts to present oneself as someone else or accidentally through changes in facial structure due to puberty?

    What better group to test your system on then a bunch of teenagers.
    They ARE smarter than anyone else anyway (or so they think) and it is in their nature to go against the system and find a way to "play it".
    Plus their faces change through puberty on their own.

    Perfect test subjects I'd say.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens