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Police To Begin iPhone Iris Scans

Posted by samzenpus on from the look-at-the-phone-citizen dept.

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."

34 of 197 comments (clear)

  1. And Lemme Guess... by The+O+Rly+Factor · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:And Lemme Guess... by tsotha · · Score: 2

      Why would you assume a warrant is necessary? There's no constitutional right to not be photographed.

    2. Re:And Lemme Guess... by TWX · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Does a normal picture at a reasonable distance, even a distance as small as a foot, manage to get an accurate representation of one's iris? I don't think that even the highest quality cameras on the market are that good. The camera must be in one's face and the subject must not move, blink, or move one's eye (which could require some kind of restraining of the individual).

      Obtaining an iris scan is probably invasive enough to require a compelling reason to perform it, and my guess is that under most circumstances that means that one is either 1) already being arrested, or 2) being served a warrant for the collection of it.

      --
      Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    3. Re:And Lemme Guess... by The+O+Rly+Factor · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because it seems like the equivalent of being booked, fingerprinted, and mugshot every time you get pulled over for a traffic violation. If you don't like the picture and the information on my ID, then go fuck yourself.

    4. Re:And Lemme Guess... by interkin3tic · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There's a major difference between being "photographed" and "Citizen! Stand still, hold your eyelids open, let us photograph it, then wait while we find your identity!" Whether that major difference will be recognized by the courts is another matter.

      And, in case you think something not being in the constitution is a good reason why such a thing SHOULD not be in the constitution, realize it would have been pretty impressive were the founding fathers to predict cameras and iphones and put protections in against them.

    5. Re:And Lemme Guess... by Yvan256 · · Score: 2

      Why do you assume those renegades are red?

    6. Re:And Lemme Guess... by I'm+not+really+here · · Score: 2

      Why do I suddenly have images of Minority Report in my mind... little spiders built with this technology in it, remotely controlled, identifying everyone in a building quickly... completely disregarding the rights of the people to be secure from unreasonable search...

      --
      Before commenting on the Bible, please read it first
    7. Re:And Lemme Guess... by LordLimecat · · Score: 2

      And, in case you think something not being in the constitution is a good reason why such a thing SHOULD not be in the constitution, realize it would have been pretty impressive were the founding fathers to predict cameras and iphones and put protections in against them.

      Whether or not something SHOULD be in the constitution is irrelevant when discussing whether or not something IS unconstitutional.

    8. Re:And Lemme Guess... by Mr.+Freeman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      A ban against this absolutely SHOULD NOT be in the constitution. It would be ridiculous to try and imagine every single thing that could possibly be invented in the future to infringe on our rights. The constitution lays down rights such as "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures". ANYTHING that violates these rights is unconstitutional. I think the 4th amendment does a fine job here.

      Now, anything in "plain view" is obviously not protected by the 4th amendment. Seems to me that although your iris is in "plain view", specific details about it are not. Anything that requires a $3000 lens assembly attached to a sophisticated piece of electronic equipment cannot possibly be regarded as "in plain view" by any reasonable person. The problem is that lawyers and police officers are usually far from reasonable and generally have little, if any, common sense.

      --
      -1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
    9. Re:And Lemme Guess... by TWX · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Take a picture of someone, fine.

      Hold them down to scan their iris though? Gimme a break...

      --
      Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    10. Re:And Lemme Guess... by flaming+error · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The constitution was not intended to be about citizens. It originally enumerated responsibilities of the government, and placed restrictions on the government.

      The Bill of Rights were amendments placed there to appease the fears of certain states who worried the federal government might get out of hand.

      These amendments are not some whitelist of rights that the founders generously allowed us little people, they are lines in the sand that indicate when the federal government is becoming the master instead of the servant.

      This "there is no constitutional right" thinking is bullshit. We The People have the right to do anything the hell we want that doesn't infringe on the rights of our brothers.

      What the government thinks our rights should be is [supposed to be] irrelevant - if we want their opinion, we should give it to them.

      But alas, we have collectively accepted a role as obedient subjects to a higher authority, and The Constitution has become just another brand of toilet paper.

    11. Re:And Lemme Guess... by slashqwerty · · Score: 5, Informative

      That didn't stop the US Supreme Court from ruling that police helicopters operating infared cameras scanning houses from above were not a "search."

      I think you are referring to Kyllo v United States which ruled exactly the opposite of what you have stated. The court concluded that using infrared cameras to scan homes for leaking heat is a search and thus requires a warrant under the fourth amendment. The basis for the court's opinion was very similar to the grandparent post.

      Of course, that ruling also involved Clarence "just bribe my wife" Thomas. So, maybe it'll one day be reversed by a saner court.

      The ruling did indeed involve Thomas who joined the majority opinion in a 5-4 decision. Quite frankly I would consider any court that reverses the ruling to be less sane.

    12. Re:And Lemme Guess... by Dan667 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      9th Amendment protects any rights that are not covered in the Constitution.

    13. Re:And Lemme Guess... by protektor · · Score: 3, Informative

      You might want to think again and look up all the lawsuits that celebrities have filed against paparazzi for using giant telephoto lens to take pictures through their house windows and all of that. The photographers are on public property but that still doesn't get them out of trouble most of the time. There is also the issue of you are not free to photograph just anyone for any reason you want. There are court rulings, thus laws against that as well. There is also the issue of recording people, and their expectation of privacy. There are loads of legal precedence to cover privacy. It isn't in the Constitution per-say but many will and have argued that "the pursuit of happiness" and right against "unreasonable search and seizure" are the foundations for expected privacy. Many people have argued quite successfully that those are directly things that show people have a right to be left alone, thus privacy. There is a lot of case law that backs up this idea as well. So while you think you may be right that there is no Constitutional right to privacy, I would bet that in fact most lawyers would say that is not the case and you are not looking at the intent of the founding fathers and what they wrote about before and while crafting the Constitution. Remember many of the states forced compromises on the federal government to sign the Constitution because they wanted the federal government to stay the hell out of the states business and let them run things rather than the federal government always telling them what they can and can't do. They also wanted the governments in general to stay the hell out of people's lives other than the absolute bare minimum that was required. Somehow this country has gotten so very far away from that idea. So clearly what you are saying is not correct in reality. You do have a legal expectation of privacy in the US.

    14. Re:And Lemme Guess... by protektor · · Score: 3, Insightful

      People forget what the founding fathers said about rights. They said that all rights come from God or the people or a higher power or whatever. Right absolutely do not come from the government in any way shape or form. You have every right you were born with, unless that right is specifically taken away. I do not see any laws passed or things added to the US Constitution that says I have to give up my right to privacy. So until such a law is passed by the majority of the people, I will always have my right to privacy and it doesn't come from the government to allow me the right to privacy. You have to understand what the US Constitution actually is, what it is crafted to do, and what powers and rights it gives to the Federal government. It also helps if you read the federalist papers, the letters and such written around that time, and the Constitutional Congress minutes to get an idea of what they were trying to do. You might want to look at what was going on in Europe and how it was run to get an idea of how they were trying to do things differently.

    15. Re:And Lemme Guess... by Jaysyn · · Score: 4, Informative

      The constitution limits what the government can do, not what you can't do. However, the US Supreme Court has declared that the "Right to Privacy" is inherent from the 1st, 3rd, 4th, 9th & 14th Amendments.

      http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/rightofprivacy.html

      http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html#privacy

      --
      There is a war going on for your mind.
    16. Re:And Lemme Guess... by LordLimecat · · Score: 2

      I think pretty much every lawyer would LOVE to take a case where police, with no warrant, court order, or probable cause, physically restrained someone. That would (IANAL, IMO, etc) seem to be a pretty clear violation of "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures".

      But im still not seeing how someone taking an iris scan of you unawares would violate that, or how it is substantially different than photographing you and then looking your pic up in a database. Possibly there are other relevant laws, but again this does NOT seem to violate the CONSTITUTION, which is what the discussion (constitutionality) is about.

    17. Re:And Lemme Guess... by Attila+Dimedici · · Score: 2

      The Constitution enumerates various powers and responsibilities of the various branches of government, it is not however an exhaustive list.

      It was intended to be. The Constitution was intended to be an exhaustive list of the powers of the Federal government. The Tenth Ammendment was written to emphasize this: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." Further, James Madison said this: "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents." Other Founding Fathers made similar statements about the limits to the power of the Federal Government. On the other hand, the Bill of Rights was never intended to be an exhaustive list of the rights ofthe people
      When I searched for the above quote so that I would get it worded correctly, I came across another James Madison quote that I really like, “It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.”

      --
      The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
  2. Why iPhone? by drb226 · · Score: 2

    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?

    1. Re:Why iPhone? by mswhippingboy · · Score: 5, Funny

      Because Apple has a patent on the eye phone.

      --
      Sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel is the headlight of an oncoming train.
  3. What a waste. by flimflammer · · Score: 2

    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?

    1. Re:What a waste. by VirginMary · · Score: 4, Insightful

      So let me get this straight. I can't afford an iphone, but taxes are being taken from my meager paycheck in order to give them to police officers and soldiers?

      You probably can't afford a tank or fighter plane either and taxes are taken from your paycheck in order to give them to soldiers. What's your point?

      --
      When 1person suffers from a delusion,it is called insanity.When many people suffer from a delusion,it is called religion
  4. Why the rush to identify the suspect? by joelsanda · · Score: 2

    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.

    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.
  5. Better not be doing it without consent. by dannymac63 · · Score: 2

    If a civilian did this to a police officer they'd be arrested for wiretapping.

    --
    Insert witty comment here.
  6. Facial Recognition Screws With the Wrong Man by Coolhand2120 · · Score: 3, Informative
    That's great, except for when it's not:
    From gizmodo:

    Technology may be a pivot for many of our lives, but it's not exactly infallible. A Massachusetts man learnt that the hard way, after his driver's license was flagged as a fake on the police system, due to a facial-recognition error.

    It seems John H. Gass looks rather similar to another Massachusetts driver, causing the system to revoke his license after figuring his must be the fake. Rather than head down to the DVLA to sort out the problem, he was instead banned from driving for two weeks, and only won it back after he managed to prove he was who he said he was. Worse yet, it's estimated another 1,000 drivers faced a similar problem last year.

    The facial recognition software that the state of Massachusetts uses is identical to the one 34 other states use, paving the way for many more opportunities of mistaken identity for the future.

    1. Re:Facial Recognition Screws With the Wrong Man by KahabutDieDrake · · Score: 5, Informative

      Not it will not. Portable DNA matching? You have been watching a little too much CSI my friend. It still takes a lab full of equipment, consumables and trained professionals to create a DNA profile and compare it to a sample or database. Even then, it's not nearly as accurate as you've been lied to believe. See, they don't actually sequence your DNA that would take too long, so they only do a profile. Which, while it might match a sample from the crime scene, it does not positively identify any one person. Only a class of people.

      For instance, if the sample from the crime scene came from a white male of non-jewish decent, then that sample profile will match something like 15% of all white males of non-jewish decent. Even more, it will match all the males in a particular blood line. (depending on sample).

    2. Re:Facial Recognition Screws With the Wrong Man by pipedwho · · Score: 5, Informative

      Mod parent up.

      DNA testing is far more useful to prove exclusion with great confidence, because the 'match' size is only one to one. But - that does NOT mean we can extend this methodology to prove a positive match against a database with thousands of random entries. If a sample does not match the suspect, then it can generally be shown that the sample did NOT originate from the suspect - the inverse however, is not necessarily true.

      When samples do match to some degree, it can only be shown that there is some likelihood that a sample came from the suspect - a likelihood that is completely dependent on the search criteria and database size when matching the sample to a list of 'suspects'. The bigger the database, the less reliable the result.

      For example, if a there are three unrelated people in a room, and I take a sample from each one of them, then a lab could determine with extreme confidence which sample goes with which person. If I do the same with 10000 random people in the room, the probability of correctly identifying a given sample falls dramatically - in fact, it is likely that the sample will 'match' hundreds of people.

      As can be seen from the above examples, Gataca / [insert favourite TV crime show] style DNA matching is still far from realistic with current technology.

  7. Re:Eeh. In private hands? by YrWrstNtmr · · Score: 2

    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

  8. What happens by Dyinobal · · Score: 3, Interesting

    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?

    1. Re:What happens by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You pre-suppose that I did anything.

      If I am randomly stopped by a police officer who wishes to take an iris scan, this isn't about me being innocent and 'working with the police to prove my innocence' ... This completely violates the assumption that I am innocent in the first place. On what basis have you established that I might not be innocent? Because you don't like my hat?

      I seriously don't get people who think it is natural that I should subject myself to being arbitrarily catalogued and identified on the whim of some cop with a shiny gadget.

      There used to be a presumption that I was free to go about my business, until a police officer had probable cause. In your version of things, random stops and 'papers please' becomes the norm ... This is not what a free society does.

      What you are effectively saying is "think of the children" ... The mistaken belief that we should allwaive our rights so that the nebulous concept of "the greater good" can be served.

      Fuck that.

      Police don't get to walk up to me on the street and 'suggest' that I allow myself to be fingerprinted ... WTF is different about this just because it s fast and automated?

      If you don't get this, you are part of the problem.

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    2. Re:What happens by njahnke · · Score: 2

      they're going to mace you to get your eyes ... open?

    3. Re:What happens by Jorth · · Score: 2

      These kind of things can only go one way. If people are forced to submit to iris scans on whim, how long before they become common practice to be scanned on entering public buildings, then private companies would latch on to the idea for staff checking, time clocking (a great love of many industries) next thing you know you are tracked around the city.

      I know I am probably exagerating a little, but there's no good that can come from this. Living in the UK sometimes I dream that we had a beautiful document like the consitution that you have over in the USA, but it pains me to see a well crafted protector of the people being completely ignored on a daily basis. This TSA stuff, police filming, etc what the hell happened to the country where anyone could achieve anything through free enterprise. In the next couple of generations America is going to change a lot, and currently I don't see many good things in the pipeline. When I was a teen I used to think America was this super cool place I wanted to go to someday, now I don't want to fly there because I have a urostomy and I don't want to be felt up by some TSA agent etc. You've changed America and not in a cool fun way, in a scary as WTF is going on kinda way...

  9. Why iphone? by tompaulco · · Score: 2

    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.
  10. UK does mobile fingerprint already by martin · · Score: 2

    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 !