Facial Recognition Gone Wrong

An anonymous reader writes "John H. Gass hadn't had a traffic ticket in years, so the Natick resident was surprised this spring when he received a letter from the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles informing him to cease driving because his license had been revoked. It turned out Gass was flagged because he looks like another driver, not because his image was being used to create a fake identity. His driving privileges were returned but, he alleges in a lawsuit, only after 10 days of bureaucratic wrangling to prove he is who he says he is. And apparently, he has company. Last year, the facial recognition system picked out more than 1,000 cases that resulted in State Police investigations, officials say. And some of those people are guilty of nothing more than looking like someone else. Not all go through the long process that Gass says he endured, but each must visit the Registry with proof of their identity. Massachusetts began using the software after receiving a $1.5 million grant from the US Department of Homeland Security as part of an effort to prevent terrorism, reduce fraud, and improve the reliability and accuracy of personal identification documents that states issue."

Comments

Nice work.

[geminidomino]

Massachusetts began using the software... to prevent terrorism, reduce fraud, and improve the reliability and accuracy of personal identification documents that states issue."

Came up snake-eyes on that role, dincha?

Re:Guilty until proven innocent

[Vanderhoth]

According to the statement you're guilty until you prove your innocent, so much for innocent until proven guilty. I'm sure using tax dollars and grants to use a system that illegally convicts innocent people without a trial or hearing is considerable different then a criminal stealing someones identity.

I've got nothing to hide

[captainpanic]

... except my face apparently.

Anyone still wondering why privacy is such an important issue? I never want to hear the "I have nothing to hide" argument again.

Oblig. Star Trek reference

[TapeCutter]

you're guilty until you prove your innocent

...because it would be unfair to put an innocent person on trial.

Re:Oblig. Star Trek reference

[cHALiTO]

I used to work with fingerprint identification systems for some police forces, and that's how they do it. AFIS systems are only a tool to narrow down and (enormously) speed up the candidate search process. The decision to declare a match is ALWAYS up to a human expert, after careful review of the results from the system.
The only kind-of-exception to this are from portable devices the police uses for example at football matches, on which they have loaded the patterns for wanted persons. They scan everyone going into the stadium, and if they got a match (automatic, 99.9% accurate, but false positives ARE possible), the person is taken into the nearest police station for a more serious AFIS check, with an expert determining if there's a match.

Instant revoking of licenses or serious decisions like that shouldn't be left to automatic systems, no matter how accurate they might be. This has to be always a human decision, and one of the main reasons is that humans have to take responsibility for their actions and can be held accountable. The identification system is just a tool to help people do their jobs better/faster (not to do it for them).

Re:Guilty until proven innocent

[indyogb]

“A driver’s license is not a matter of civil rights. It’s not a right. It’s a privilege..."

So says the government(s). I disagree. Just because something isn't specifically protected by the Constitution doesn't mean it isn't a right. Travel by the standard means of the time (in this case, automobiles), is a natural right. Also, it is nice that a system used to "prevent terrorism" is being used to suspend driver's licenses of ordinary, non-terrorist, citizens.

Government(s) in the US are at flank speed ahead towards power and control. Even the court system is on their side (e.g. imminent domain for increased tax revenues from a few years back, recent rulings about police entering homes w/o warrants in IN, etc., etc.). In the end, it is all about the $$$. Where is it, who has it, and how can we get more of it.

Re:Bayesian statistics

[captainpanic]

If the 99.99% figure is apparently misleading, and if the 99.99% figure is apparently the only one that the politicians look at, stop presenting the 99.99% figure!!!

Re:Bayesian statistics

[djmurdoch]

The 99.99% figure is the only one that is reliable. The 9% figure depends on things that vary over time outside the control of the company selling the software, i.e. the proportion of true terrorists (or other true targets) in the passenger stream.

The problem is the education system, that doesn't teach even basic numerical reasoning to people who need to use it all the time.

Re:Nothing to see here...move along

[jenningsthecat]

Being a member of a functioning society means you need to participate -- check your mail and respond when asked reasonable questions by state authorities...

A computer says I look like a lawbreaker, so I have to take time off work and get myself to a government office with my ID in order to prove the computer wrong. In what non-Fascist, non-totalitarian country is this a 'reasonable question'?

To me, this is about as 'reasonable' as having to be fondled and/or irradiated to board an airplane. This 'functioning society' is growing more disfunctional with each passing day.