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Police To Begin iPhone Iris Scans
cultiv8 writes "Dozens of police departments nationwide are gearing up to use a tech company's already controversial iris- and facial-scanning device that slides over an iPhone and helps identify a person or track criminal suspects. The smartphone-based scanner, named Mobile Offender Recognition and Information System, or MORIS, is made by BI2 Technologies in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and can be deployed by officers out on the beat or back at the station. An iris scan, which detects unique patterns in a person's eyes, can reduce to seconds the time it takes to identify a suspect in custody. This technique also is significantly more accurate than results from other fingerprinting technology long in use by police, BI2 says. When attached to an iPhone, MORIS can photograph a person's face and run the image through software that hunts for a match in a BI2-managed database of U.S. criminal records. Each unit costs about $3,000."
Telling the cop that he's gonna need a warrant to use it on you will get you slapped with an obstruction of justice and resisting arrest charge, right? That's usually the crime given to those rouge renegades that dare try to use their rights.
I already burned off my prints... do I really need to have some glass eyes made?
As many problems as there are in government databases, they generally don't use the contents of the databases for marketing, and they're supposed to attempt to keep access to the data restricted to only those with legitimate reason. That could include law enforcement or legal officials, or the person who is the subject of the file, with the proper request. It's also easier (note, I didn't say easy) to get improper data corrected. Law enforcement, being a portion of the executive branch in whatever jurisdiction or level of government it's associated with, is subject to legislation and legal rulings that can force changes or compliance.
Companies' purpose is profit. Right now that profit comes from the devices and the subscription to the data. Down the road, the company might see an opportunity for profit from mining the data in an anonymous fashion to the subjects of the data, or might find mining in an identifiable way, or might find that allowing third parties access to the data who otherwise shouldn't. Or, the data might be incorrect, outdated, or fraudulent, and government and law enforcement entities might end up creating more problems with bad arrests or worse based on flawed data from a private database. Additionally, a company might be harder to manage, even through legislation or court ruling, as there's a level of opacity through the corporate structure.
Make the devices, fine. Sell them to law enforcement, fine. Retain the data "for the customer", not fine.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/07/14/2120221/App-Uses-Facial-Profiling-To-Identify-Perps
If this device already costs $3,000 I really don't see why they would specialize it to work with a $600 iPhone, of all things. Why not just give it its own screen and network connection?
Time to re-read Apple's iPhone service agreement to make sure I'm not being tracked via iris scans.
I don't understand why an iPhone is necessary here. Surely they could have included all the necessary components an iPhone would provide and it would even be cheaper. Sounds like unnecessary baggage tied in to look more trendy. Since when do police apartments need to look trendy?
Why is it so important to reduce the amount of time to seconds to identify a suspect? At this point, when you're taking a picture of a suspect's eye, the person is either freely cooperating or has been beaten down and is cuffed and forced to cooperate. And the cops already had a good idea of who they were after (at least in some, but admittedly not all) cases.
Before this is seen as solving a problem I think we need to know how long it takes to identify a suspect now, and what happens in the time allegedly saved with the old system and new one?
Finally, this will only work if you're already in the system, right? So it will only reduce time on those folks that have already been caught, had their picture taken, and are then caught again by a cop with this application in a jurisdiction where the cop can access the data?
The Luddites were ahead of their time.
Remember, that as a *suspect* you can be scanned, cataloged and the records kept forever, even if its found that you have no part of the crime being investigated.
Its not just criminals.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
If a civilian did this to a police officer they'd be arrested for wiretapping.
Insert witty comment here.
God bless Canada, where the government still has some respect for its citizens' privacy and it's country's laws.
Not only you'll enjoy better protection from identity theft (lol SSNs), but these silly schemes will become unnecessary.
From gizmodo:
As many problems as there are in government databases, they generally don't use the contents of the databases for marketing, and they're supposed to attempt to keep access to the data restricted to only those with legitimate reason. That could include law enforcement or legal officials, or the person who is the subject of the file, with the proper request.
You can continue to think that.
Florida made $62 million by selling Florida drivers' license information
Drivers histories $40
Just drop all pretense and laser burn bar code onto everyone's forehead already.We're nothing but numbers to them anyhow.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
What happens if I refuse to open my eyes for the required scan? Is it resisting arrest? can closing your eyes during an arrest be considered resisting? Will they mace me to get my eyes open? and won't that effect the scan?
Oh no! They have SCMODS!
I would think that the same rules in effect for getting fingerprinted should apply. I don't recall police running around finger printing people unless they have been named a suspect, charged, etc.. Normally part of the booking process.
To allow an officer to scan you when he would not have normally been able to get you fingerprinted would be wrong.
The Blues Brothers were NOT criminals, they were on a MISSION FROM GOD!
The City of Tampa, Florida tried using "facial recognition" software in the Ybor City night club district several years ago. After about a 1 year trial period it was discarded as being too unreliable. I can see this being used until the wrong person is arrested and brings a huge law suit against the municipality and that will be the end of it. Not to mention religions such as the Amish who do not want their pictures taken.
No way this will be abused.
In a stroke of engineering tour de force, law enforcement now has the tool necessary to disseminate in real time, the racial description of any suspect. Whilst in the past, society was burdened with vague generic description such as 5'10", average build, now descriptions will be in the form of 5'10", average build, NEGRO, for example.
Why not just make the device USB based so they can scan it into their existing mobile and office hardware. Then they can save $600 AND $100 a month in data plan charges.
No, that's still going to be too expensive relative to the additional safety provided to citizens. Just scrap the whole idea.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Good luck if it's an iPhone 3GS that constantly shuts down when running anything more intensive than email.
Is it gold plated?
I wish it would be illegal for governments to spend money wastefully!
So was Jesus and didn't the Romans execute him as a criminal? :D
You have been sadly deceived. The states have sold their databases to the highest bidders on many many occasions. You should also look at the Fusion Centers that are not government groups/divisions but rather private companies that are supported with grants from the federal government and full database access to all the government criminal and regular databases. They have full access to law enforcement and routinely send out information to law enforcement as to what they should be doing and the types of people they should be watching and monitoring. This isn't a government agency. They are private corporations and there are generally at least 2 of these Fusion Centers in every state.
You then throw in how every single administration has been cause pulling FBI files and such of their political opponents. You quickly see that every government database is for sale and abused on a regular basis. Police constantly do look-ups on neighbors and people they are dating or people dating their friends or family members. Police abuse their database access all the time and rarely are punished for it, and almost never publicly.
The government clearly can not be trusted with databases of people. They constantly abuse them. They put bad information in them, like the horribly inaccurate no fly list, and getting data corrected is impossible just ask several Congress members. The list just goes on and on. We do not need to be letting any level of government (state or federal) to have any more databases to abuse. Too bad if their job is hard and it would be easier if they had these. My life would be easier if I could just kill everyone who annoyed me as well, and take money anytime I wanted from banks with no legal problems. Neither are going to happen and the government and law enforcement just need to work harder, and too bad if their job is hard, they can always quit.
One small step ahead of the kit readily available the UK police for a while now.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8549875.stm
Of course we've got decent Data Protection Legislation and one dat we'll get a DPC with teeth to enforce them !
is building up a vast database of DNA profiles, ready to duplicate and add to crime scenes or evidence. No more stone-cold whodunnits and my, our political enemies sure are starting to commit a lot of crimes, aren't they? And given that juries are as dumb as a bag of hammers on the subject (DNA match = guilt)...
Not really. Jesus was put up before the Romans by the Pharisees, a Jewish sect. The Romans were the power at that time and place. They ruled the secular society. If someone were to be punished for religious crimes then that religious group would mete out the punishment. But the Pharisees wanted Jesus' followers to know that they were in charge of Judaism. They basically presented Jesus to the Romans with charges of being an anarchist/anti-Roman, rabble rouser type. Governor Pontius Pilate examined Jesus and found him not guilty of organizing against the Romans and "washed his hand of this matter". The Pharisees then wanted him put to death and the Romans executed him.
Land of the free home of the brave HA HA
Anybody know of a web site I can buy contact lenses that would hide/modify an iris pattern without affecting the wearer's vision?
Maybe I ought to get a patent on that......
It would be funny, if it weren't so sad....
It's okay to pin someone to the ground and scan their eyeballs from a foot away, but it's illegal to videotape police from the safety of one's own property?
To any rational thinking person, iris scanning while being restrained would be a 4th amendment violation if done without a warrant or probable cause.
Elwood: I bet these cops got SCMODS.
Jake: SCMODS?
Elwood: State County Municipal Offender Data System.
Iris scan works at 6 inches and requires corporation.
Face scan works at 6 feet and does not require corporation.
They are being treated differently.
The Chief of Police in Boston [I think - WSJ had an article on this last week] said that he was instructing his police officers to use the face scan whenever. That is was just like taking a picture or other observation techniques that the police use. I think this has been tested in court. Iris scans were only to be administered when there was probably cause. I think on the street Iris scans have not been tested.
And as anybody who has grown up in a small town knows, there is a difference between anonymity vs. privacy.
The iPhone is way too fragile for police work. They will end up broken the first day out in the field! Just look at how easily they are broken by civilians in regular life, now imagine what they'd be subjected to just by being carried by the average police officer on the job.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Oh yea, like the Pharisees forced the poor Romans to kill Jesus.
Face it, the Romans (Italians, of course) were the occupying power and had the last word. The Italians, and nobody else, killed Jesus and it's time this fact was shouted from the rooftops.
NO, you can not photograph my iris or my face, as long as police are arresting people for photographing THEM doing their job. "If you aren't doing anything wrong, you shouldn't care!" cuts both ways.
The Moris device uses three technologies to identify people; facial recognition, iris recognition and fingerprint recognition.
To me it is equivalent to an officer asking for my ID. Police do not have the time to wander around randomly snapping pictures of people and checking to see who they are. If a police officer has cause to ask for my ID they have cause to verify it using Moris.
The iris scan does not require someone to hold their eye open for a period of time; the picture is taken just like any other iPhone picture. It is the same as getting a DMV photo taken; stand there, don's blink till I say.