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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."
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.
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!
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.
Wearing a mask is rather blunt. I think surveillance evading camouflage make-up instead will turn out to be a fashion trend during the next decade.
As with any trend, only a handful of people would dare walk around looking like that at first - privacy supporters, activists, etc. - and they would stand out in the crowd. But the idea of camouflage might catch on as more people opted-in (some because of privacy concerns, others because it just looks cool and futuristic). Kind of like torn jeans and facial piercings from punk - they used to look shocking to some a while back, but nowadays are completely mainstream and disconnected from the originating subculture.
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.
even older news! I saw the anglo-dutch company Logica demonstrate this at a PSV Eindhoven football (soccer) match where it picked a dozen volunteers (who were photo'd before the match) out of the 20,000 strong crowd using the stadiums own crappy cctv footage - this was in the early to mid 2000's. It wasn't perfect but was above 90%.
Sadly, the UK is way ahead when it comes to CCTV technology.
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)