Slashdot Mirror
Public Facial Recognition Is Making Gains In Surveillance
dryriver writes in with a link to a Times story about the U.S. government's capabilities when it comes to facial recognition. "The federal government is making progress on developing a surveillance system that would pair computers with video cameras to scan crowds and automatically identify people by their faces, according to newly disclosed documents and interviews with researchers working on the project. The Department of Homeland Security tested a crowd-scanning project called the Biometric Optical Surveillance System — or BOSS — last fall after two years of government-financed development. Although the system is not ready for use, researchers say they are making significant advances. That alarms privacy advocates, who say that now is the time for the government to establish oversight rules and limits on how it will someday be used. There have been stabs for over a decade at building a system that would help match faces in a crowd with names on a watch list — whether in searching for terrorism suspects at high-profile events like a presidential inaugural parade, looking for criminal fugitives in places like Times Square or identifying card cheats in crowded casinos."
CTU showed this technology like two years ago. Even works on vending machine reflections.
I think the article and DHS are a few years behind the curve on this. See these guys:
http://www.nicta.com.au/media/previous_releases3/2012_media_releases/australian_face_recognition_technology_wins_major_international_ict_award
Also, there are a couple of live systems out there that I've heard about in airports. They could add facial recognition, but mainly they're used for object detection.
It's just a shame that these otherwise bright individuals choose to advance technology for the government in ways that move us ever closer to a police state... But then again, it's going to happen eventually, and what we really need is to stop the government from using it.
I bought a Guy Fawkes mask...
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
I find it so ironic that it's cute and I just want to give it a big cuddle...
That alarms privacy advocates, who say that now is the time for the government to establish oversight rules and limits on how it will someday be used.
Are these privacy advocates aware that the folks who want this most are the government that they are going to ask to curtail the ability to do it? It's like asking the playground bully to ask for permission to steal your lunch money...
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
Now 30% better at facial recognition than the old BOSS.
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
Usually, we're not. No, really. Yes, everyone can see you. But the expense of doing it to everyone is so prohibitive that, at least so far, law enforcement limited it to people where they had reason to do it. As they should.
With this, it becomes trivial to do it to everyone. We have a hunch that X might have done something illegal, let's trace back his last 2 months. And it's a rather small step from "we think he did something illegal" to "he annoyed someone in power, let's find something illegal".
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
whether in searching for terrorism suspects at high-profile events like a presidential inaugural parade, looking for criminal fugitives in places like Times Square or identifying card cheats in crowded casinos
Or just recording where everyone goes and storing it for 5 years in case they need it.
It'll just be "metadata". They won't be able to see what you're actually thinking, so that'll make it okay. At least until the next scumbag America-hater comes along and exposes how they were lying to us and spying on us for our freedom, cuz yanno, the terrorists hate our freedom.
Er, 9/11 and stuff. LOOK! BOMBS and BAD GUYS!
Here's a kitten.
Look where all this talking got us, baby.
Er, 9/11 and stuff. LOOK! BOMBS and BAD GUYS!
It's actually fascinating how completely Obama copied this strategy from Bush. I kind of figured it would stop working 12 years later.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Haven't we had enough of this shit yet? Just because something is technically feasible doesn't mean it's inevitable. If you're an engineer or developer working on this shit then please, do us all a favour and STOP, NOW. And don't give me any shit about having to earn a crust, etc. that just shows your moral compass needs recalibrating.
Facial recognition with good images works just fine on a database population the size of the USA.
Costs and speeds from the 1990s are not the issue as the measurement math is very simple and very fast per face.
The only past limit was legal national/state database image sharing.
You just need to get an image at the right height ie cameras on a road side checkpoints covering average passenger and driver car/truck/van face heights.
Local Feature Analysis ~ 80 points on a face, 14-22 nodal points, in 2000 you could get searching at ~ 60 million faces a minute for a few $10 million in grants.
Trying to rebuild a face only seen from one side over a few fames is harder but will soon be done with very complex 3d work.
eg "Although the technology is capable of scanning approximately seventy million images per minute,.... " http://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1336&context=vlr
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
CTU showed this technology like two years ago. Even works on vending machine reflections.
Yes it is old inconsequential news but that is a feature not a bug. The Times really really really needed a security surveillance state "story" to try and keep itself semi relevant in the eyes of their readers but at the same time not bite the hand that feeds them (i.e. more than a cosy relationship with the goverment).
What if you're at the amusement park and your child gets lost in the crowd and is nowhere to be found? BOSS can help!
What if you have Alzheimer's and you wander off the reservation? BOSS can help!
What if you suspect your hubby is dipping his stinger in some floozie's honeypot and you need to know? BOSS can help!
Can't stand it when you see people you don't recognize? BOSS can help.
What if you're a humble multinational bank that needs to track down deadbeat student loan defaulters? BOSS can help!
What if you is a notorious drug kingpin and you wants the po-po to hunt down your bitterest of rivals fo sho? BOSS can help!
What if you just don't like it when people look a bit "funny" or "suspicious" or "dark"? BOSS. CAN. HELP.
BOSS. Because you have nothing left to hide.
AQ as radical Muslims, hate anyone who is not a radical Muslim.
That might be true for the hard core, for the ideologues. But AQ would have a hell of a hard time recruiting their footsoldiers if they did not have the (valid, as in factually true) argument that the US (and other Western powers, but almost always at US direction) are propping up the dictators who repress them and their families.
Which has been true for decades. That it is not widely known, or accepted, inside the US might be because this doesn't really fit well with the narrative that the States are, as a matter of definition, the Good Guys and endeavour to spread democracy, and all that. So it gets ignored or glossed over by the mainstream media. Media that, compared to global standards, spend astonishingly little time on "foreign news", anyway.
Gosh, thanks. That must be why the other ships call me Meatfucker -- GCU Grey Area (Eccentric)
...the wearing of masks in public.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........