52 Million Photos In FBI's Face Recognition Database By Next Year

Advocatus Diaboli writes "The EFF has been investigating the FBI's Next-Generation Identification (NGI) scheme, an enormous database of biometric information. It's based on the agency's fingerprint database, which already has 100 million records. But according to the documents EFF dug up, the NGI database will include 52 million images of people's faces by 2015. At least 4.3 million images will have been taken outside any sort of criminal context. 'Currently, if you apply for any type of job that requires fingerprinting or a background check, your prints are sent to and stored by the FBI in its civil print database. However, the FBI has never before collected a photograph along with those prints. This is changing with NGI. Now an employer could require you to provide a 'mug shot' photo along with your fingerprints. If that's the case, then the FBI will store both your face print and your fingerprints along with your biographic data.'"

Comments

In like Rubin

[smittyoneeach]

The camera goes 'click'
You're in DB, like Rick
But we've got the trick
To make your chin slick
Burma Shave

Re:tie that to K'nect camera

[ackthpt]

and we are one step closer to a 1984 'Big Brother is watching' world....

and active investigations only my ass -they will stockpile this for the rest of our lives and when they find some association 20 years from now they will backtrack all the way to all other associations NSA 'metadata' style with the same deniability.

-I'm just sayin' -we're screwed

o Sunglasses
o Facial Hair
o Make-up
o Big Floppy Hat

These are your weapons, use them wisely.

Falsely accused

[Anonymous Coward]

Just remember that the best defense against being falsely accused of a crime is to SHUT UP. Exercise your right to remain silent or in England and Canada reply no comment to every question. You do NOT want to waste your time doing battle with cops who couldn't care less if you are guilty or innocent. You are just a means to an end to them. They will elect whoever they think they can take down for the rap.

Re:Falsely accused

[nctritech]

People also don't seem to remember that background checks don't catch high-risk people, particularly the ones that have never been caught or are risky due to behavior and attitude rather than past actions. They deny jobs to people who have strong incentives to walk the straight and narrow path while giving management a false sense of security about the big red unknowns. They way they are used assumes past transgressions (even if only a single one exists) are a guaranteed predictor of future actions, which would only be true if humans never, ever changed and learned and grew.

The thief with a squeaky clean record is a bigger danger than the guy with one trial for larceny; "squeaky" looks like he's a model employee, while "tainted" faces much harsher punishment if convicted of another crime plus the destruction of the rebuilt life he's working on, which is hard enough because even renting a house in the middle of nowhere tends to require "background checks" that ultimately deny him basic needs such as housing. Inability to rebuild a stable life opens the door to commission of crime, in many cases just to survive. Sadly, America has a punishment and revenge fetish, and until that changes there will be nothing done to solve these problems.

Don't be an Employee

[pubwvj]

One more reason not to be an employee. Work for yourself.

Of course, they're going to get your photo in other ways. Facebook, blogs, etc.

Even worse...

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of people aren't aware that thanks to a law passed by California voters, if you are arrested for a felony (or a possible felony) in California, your DNA will be collected and held in a government database indefinitely

Note that you only have to be arrested for what might be later possibly considered a felony for this to occur. You don't have to be convicted. Not even charged. Everyone who is arrested in California is arrested fairly and ultimately charged and convicted... right, Occupy Oakland people?

This has even been challenged and upheld by the 9th district.

This law was passed by a 9/11-frightened public in 2004. Would such a law pass now? I strongly doubt it.

These records are never expunged.

Re:I grew a beard

[BitterOak]

Let's see how they handle that, as I keep messing around with facial hair 8^{)>

Modern facial recognition seems to be immune to facial hair changes, as well as other simple attempts to fool it. It is based more on measurements of bone structure, and distances between certain facial features such as eyes, nose and mouth. Also, sophisticated AI software is used to make the system robust against changes to some of these features as well. Unless you wear a bag over your head, it's pretty hard to fool modern systems.

Numbers don't fit

[Nethemas the Great]

I'm not quite certain how from a population of 316M people you can obtain 52M photos when the point of collection are federal background checks. With roughly 200M persons of working age, that would mean that within the next two years roughly 1 out of 4 people will be facing a work related federal security clearance check or having criminal charges filed against them. I'm not buying it. Either the 52M is bogus or they're collecting photos by other less savory mean.

Re:Don't take the job

[joe_frisch]

You may have the luxury of choosing between multiple job offers, but many people don't.

Re:tie that to K'nect camera

[SpankiMonki]

o Sunglasses
o Facial Hair
o Make-up
o Big Floppy Hat

These are your weapons, use them wisely.

You just described my mother in law out for an afternoon stroll.

Re:tie that to K'nect camera

[Trax3001BBS]

and we are one step closer to a 1984 'Big Brother is watching' world....

Or a jump...

I bought a SAMSUNG UN32F6300AFXZA smart HDTV as a computer monitor.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...

While I haven't read the Xbox ToS and Privacy statements; I have read the ones for this HDTV, it's one hell of a data miner that claims it's jurisdiction in some city in South Korea.

It can match the Xbox and Kinetic for intrusiveness and I'm sure surpass it.

The difference is you must supply a webcam for the HDTV, this is used for gestures (no joke).

With a built in WiFi, it will most likely be connected to the Internet 100% of the time, this is to use it's features, which includes social applications; so when someone hits a like button of yours somewhere it shows on your screen -being an example.

Everything you do, and watch with this HDTV is monitored and saved, this is for it's "S Recommendation" feature.

I only use it as a monitor (the price was right), and have yet to establish an account for it; which is part of it's features set-up.

Some of it's features (which I have no use for).

Smart TV
The Samsung Smart TV finds the movies and TV shows you like – and more. Navigate within the 5 Smart Hub content panels. Easily discover movies, shows, and social posts with less searching and more watching.

Smart Hub
Our new interface organizes your entertainment and content into 5 convenient panels: On TV, Movies and TV Shows, Social, Apps, and a panel for your Photos, Videos and Music.

S Recommendation
Find something good to watch. Simply click the recommend button on the remote to get instant recommended shows that are on now.

Full Web Browser
All the benefits of full web browsing, right on your TV. From social sites like Facebook and Twitter to news, weather, entertainment, blogs and more. Discover even more content possibilities with your Smart TV.

Built-in WiFi
With WiFi built right into the TV, no additional equipment is needed to connect with an existing wireless router in your home network and start browsing the web, accessing Samsung Apps or other Smart TV features.

It's also not 120Hz as claimed but 60Hz, I watch TV with my Plasma 600Hz HDTV which is also 60Hz.

52 million pictures, >= 2,421 false positives

[davecb]

According the wikipedia, the number of pictures being seen as the same with probability p is =sqrt(2d * ln(1/1-p)) If d is 52,000,000 and we use a 99% probability, then for each 21,884.6 pictures we get a false positive with a perfectly accurate matcher. And there are no perfect matchers.

This is a variant of the birthday paradox, where it only takes 100 people to get a 99.9% chance of them having the same birthday, and a mere 23 people to get a 50% chance [wikipedia].

The German Federal Security Service rejected facial matching years ago, for exactly this reason, when I was working for Siemens. The Americans did not, and supposedly stopped someone's grandma for being a (younger, male) terrorist.

If they use this, expect a week or so of everyone's grandma being arrested (;-))

--dave
Mathematicians, please feel free to check me on the numbers: I suspect I'm rather low...