Google's Satellites Could Soon See Your Face From Space

Jason Koebler (3528235) writes Two months ago, after much lobbying by the biggest satellite company in North America, DigitalGlobe, the US government relaxed restrictions to allow for commercially available satellite imagery up to 25 cm resolution—twice as detailed as the previous limit of 50 cm.
The DigitalGlobe's Worldview-3, the first commercial satellite set to capture these high-res images is set to launch this Wednesday. Six months after that, private businesses, including its regular client Google, will be able to get their hands on hyper-detailed photos and videos of the globe.

Comments

but... my face is smaller than 25 cm?

[davecotter]

doesn't that mean my entire face would be 1 pixel large?

Re:but... my face is smaller than 25 cm?

[tysonedwards]

Shhh... You aren't supposed to bring facts into a "ZOMFG SCARY HEADLINE!" debate!

Re:but... my face is smaller than 25 cm?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah yes but you forget...

ENHANCE!

Re:but... my face is smaller than 25 cm?

[nospam007]

"doesn't that mean my entire face would be 1 pixel large?"

Americans have much larger faces, even their centimeters are 2,54 larger.

Re:but... my face is smaller than 25 cm?

[gweilo8888]

This. Ridiculous, fearmongering flamebait from Slashdot, something this site is increasingly becoming associated with.

You know what Slashdot's editors want us to be terrified of the privacy implications from? Something significantly lower-resolution than existing aerial photos like this image.

Download the image, and measure the length of runway 3/21 in pixels from threshold to threshold. (Approx. 6341 pixels.) Figure out how long it should be at 25cm per pixel. (4876 pixels.) Scale the image appropriately (7500 pixels wide.) Zoom in to 1:1 resolution onscreen.

Now, are you terrified? No? Nor am I. Want to confirm I'm right about the scaling? Find a car and measure the length: it should be about 20 pixels, or 500cm for a typical full-sized US car. (I tried one, and the first one I tried was exactly 20 pixels.)

So no, I'm not scared. What I am is mildly amused that the myth of satellites that can read newspapers from space still exists. That, and surprised that imagery this (still relatively) low-resolution was ever off limits in the Internet age. And a bit disgusted that a supposed nerd site insults the intelligence of nerds who know far better, this readily.

I really should stop coming back here.

25 cm resolution

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Your face will occupy all of one quarter of a pixel 25cm x 25cm. Good luck seeing your face from satellite. It is high res. But not so high as to see a face.

Re:25 cm resolution

[tysonedwards]

The average human head is 14.5cm x 23cm x 20cm, so you are quite correct that it would mean that the average human head would occupy less than 1 pixel regardless of which axis it was observed across.

The largest recorded human head was 15.9cm x 25.5cm x 23.9cm, meaning that said person could require a second pixel, if they were observed in the appropriate axis.

It is important to note that if a person was observed laying down on the ground, they would occupy *up to* 10 pixels in the case of the world's tallest person, but the average would only require 6.

Re:25 cm resolution

[TWX]

It'd be like first pass downloading interlaced porn from the BBS days...

For those that don't know what I'm talking about...

If you think nobody's head is that big...

[jeffb (2.718)]

...you obviously haven't been hanging around here for long.

Re:Street view...

[ShaunC]

A lot of what shows up on Google Maps, especially in larger metro areas, has been photographed from planes. They're only up on nice VFR days, so there's no atmosphere in the way. Better resolution satellite stuff from Digital Globe will be nice to see, but aircraft will continue to dominate the commercial aerial imagery sector for quite awhile.