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AI Mistakes Ad On a Bus For an Actual CEO, Then Publicly Shames Them For 'Jaywalking' (scmp.com)
An anonymous reader quotes the South China Morning Post:
Since last year, many Chinese cities have cracked down on jaywalking by investing in facial recognition systems and AI-powered surveillance cameras. Jaywalkers are identified and shamed by displaying their photographs on large public screens... Developments are also underway to engage the country's mobile network operators and social media platforms, such as Tencent Holdings' WeChat and Sina Weibo, to establish a system in which offenders will receive personal text messages as soon as they are caught violating traffic rules....
Making a compelling case for change is the recent experience of Dong Mingzhu, chairwoman of China's biggest maker of air conditioners Gree Electric Appliances, who found her face splashed on a huge screen erected along a street in the port city of Ningbo... That artificial intelligence-backed surveillance system, however, erred in capturing Dong's image on Wednesday from an advertisement on the side of a moving bus. The traffic police in Ningbo, a city in the eastern coastal province of Zhejiang, were quick to recognise the mistake, writing in a post on microblog Sina Weibo on Wednesday that it had deleted the snapshot. It also said the surveillance system would be completely upgraded to cut incidents of false recognition in future.
The article says the mistakenly-accused CEO's company later thanked the traffic police for their hard work, and "called on people to obey traffic rules to keep the streets safe."
"The Chinese government is currently working to combine the operations of more than 170 million public security cameras to strengthen its surveillance network's ability to track and monitor the country's 1.4 billion citizens. Research firm IHS Markit has estimated that the number of surveillance cameras in China could reach 450 million by 2020."
Making a compelling case for change is the recent experience of Dong Mingzhu, chairwoman of China's biggest maker of air conditioners Gree Electric Appliances, who found her face splashed on a huge screen erected along a street in the port city of Ningbo... That artificial intelligence-backed surveillance system, however, erred in capturing Dong's image on Wednesday from an advertisement on the side of a moving bus. The traffic police in Ningbo, a city in the eastern coastal province of Zhejiang, were quick to recognise the mistake, writing in a post on microblog Sina Weibo on Wednesday that it had deleted the snapshot. It also said the surveillance system would be completely upgraded to cut incidents of false recognition in future.
The article says the mistakenly-accused CEO's company later thanked the traffic police for their hard work, and "called on people to obey traffic rules to keep the streets safe."
"The Chinese government is currently working to combine the operations of more than 170 million public security cameras to strengthen its surveillance network's ability to track and monitor the country's 1.4 billion citizens. Research firm IHS Markit has estimated that the number of surveillance cameras in China could reach 450 million by 2020."
The article says the mistakenly-accused CEO's company later thanked the traffic police for their hard work, and "called on people to obey traffic rules to keep the streets safe."
And all along I thought we couldn't have it both ways.
Cause your going to publicly chew out petty public officials for their half arse algorithms in China, are you? We've all been worried about 1984, when we should have been worried about Brazil.
Right now there is one camera for every ten citizens.
I was in Shanghai last month, and I saw a camera about every 100m or so. That might have been one for every 10 pedestrians on the street, but no where near one for every 10 people in the city.
Anyway, I always though that China dealt with jaywalkers by making it legal for motorists to run over them. Even in a marked cross walk, you are often risking your life in Shanghai traffic.
In Europe we simply call it crossing the road, there's not even a word for it in the languages I know. Why do americans and chinese criminalise jaywalking ? WTF do they think is wrong with simply crossing a road when no cars are present ? I don't get it.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
You'd think the AI would have figured out no one has a 5-foot-tall head?
If it's that primitive, what's to stop Chinese citizens to walk around with photographs of Mao Zedong hanging in front of their faces? It might be amusing to see the reputation score of the late, great Chairman sinking into the toilet.
#DeleteChrome
We should sell t shirts and jackets with Xi's face on them. Even better provide a printing service for photos on clothing so people can select their enemies as age for the shirts.
You seem to misunderstand what 'plausible fact' is. It doesn't sound very plausible that killing other civilians within your own country would ever be permitted anywhere. Instead it sounds like hyperbole, which is exactly what it is.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
Facial recognition to confirm an identity, or pick one out of small sample is commonplace. But to be able to identify a face and pick out one in a billion people is way beyond software ability. It is also way beyond human capability. In a billion people, there will be thousands that look almost identical.
For the facial recognition to work, it needs to know who is nearby. Not difficult when everyone carries a mobile phone. But it is unlikely that the CEO was on the bus.
For things like passport control into Australia, the system has people stand in an exact spot, with good lighting, and look at a particular point. Quite different from a random image from people walking on a road.
If they did have some magic software that really could pick out one in a billion, then it would not be fooled by a bus!
That said, the Chinese internal surveillance system is very frightening.
No Chinese would dream of that. Probably would not send them in jail, but would get the marked down badly in social credit. And maybe a fine. Certainly expulsion from the Communist party if a member.
China is not a joke. That is why people self-censor very carefully. The risks and penalties are everywhere.
Where, when the state causes you harm you have to thank them or find yourself checking in your "organ donor card" early.
Don't support, buy from, sell to, or tolerate China.
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
Thats a horrible error since it completely ignored the more serious charge of stealing a bus.
being a big CEO, she was lucky to get her picture removed quickly by the police.
i wonder how much success the average chinese person would have in a case like this.
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
I was in Shanghai last month, and I saw a camera about every 100m or so. That might have been one for every 10 pedestrians on the street, but no where near one for every 10 people in the city.
Yup, those were the cameras you saw. You might also ponder whether the biggest city in the world is a representative sample. (And that's not even counting all the smart phones.)
But the important thing is to keep saying positive things about China and it's government, assuming you wan't to keep visiting. You know they're reading your posts, and you know they know who you are.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Life is getting harder globally so we are all collectively finding someone to blame.
We see this with Brexit, Donald Trump, Increased Chinese hunting of subversives, rise in support for terrorism, racism, and nationalism...
We are not looking to ourselves to say to yourself "What am I, doing that are making things worse, which I can fix." We are looking at others say "They the others are making things worse" and actively try to make their lives more difficult. While they see you making their lives difficult and equate you the "other" is the cause of all the problems.
This creates a viscous cycle, that makes things worse, because everyone is blaming everyone else for their troubles, and making the others lives more difficult.
The only solution now takes a lot more energy and effort is to be introspective and actively try to break the cycle.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Only in an Asian nation would publicly shaming someone work. In a western culture someone would just wave smile and go their merry way. Or even better they would be a corporate 'influencer' and make an extra $ off the exposure. Look at me ! I'm on TV.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?