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Biometric Face Recognition At Your Local Mall

Posted by samzenpus on from the sunglass-and-disguise-hut dept.

dippityfisch writes "The Sydney Morning Herald reports that face recognition is being considered at Westfield's Sydney mall to catch offenders. The identification system matches images captured by surveillance cameras to an existing database of faces. Police said they could not comment on the center's intentions, but would welcome any move to improve security and technology in the area."

2 of 120 comments (clear)

  1. Re:It all comes down to what you do with it by opposabledumbs · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ah, yes. I should have been thinking of the children all along. This erosion loss of my own right to privacy is all good, because of the benefits to the children.

    No matter that most kids are abused at their home or in the home of another family member or close family friend. Let's put security cams up in the mall. That'll solve it.

    But seriously now, I'm not sure about the implications of these things: would a mall count as public or private? Generally, you wouldn't be allowed to take photos in a mall because it's private property, and they're obviously allowed to take photos of you, because they own the joint. However, what would Joe Public be able to do if he was flagged as a criminal through a false positive?

    I'd be pretty pissed if some fool tasered me while I was grocery shopping on a Saturday morning 'cos the camera erroneously ID'd me as the local pedobear or whatever...

  2. Re:It all comes down to what you do with it by laederkeps · · Score: 5, Funny

    You wear clothes in public, don't you?

    Yes, but only because last time I tried not to, they put my face in their database.