Facial recognition is here to stay. And we should all probably accept it

guest · Aug 4, 2019

Facial recognition… coming to a supermarket near you
The technology is helping to combat crimes police no longer deal with, but its use raises concerns about civil liberties
August 4, 2019
https://www.theguardian.com/technol...ch-ai-artificial-intelligence-civil-liberties

Paul Wilks runs a Budgens supermarket in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire. Like most retail owners, he’d had problems with shoplifting – largely carried out by a relatively small number of repeat offenders. Then a year or so ago, exasperated, he installed something called Facewatch.

“If someone triggers the alert,” says Paul, “they’re approached by a member of management, and asked to leave, and most of the time they duly do.”
There is a growing demand for the technology in shops, with dozens of companies selling retail facial-recognition software – perhaps because, in recent years, it has become pointless to report shoplifting to the police.

Each algorithm is different, but fundamentally, they work the same way. They are given large numbers of images of people and are told which ones are the same people; they then analyse those images to pick out the features that identify them.
It’s a black box: the training data goes into the algorithm, sloshes around a bit, and produces very effective systems, but the exact way it works is not clear to the developer.
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If someone is seen shoplifting on camera or by a staff member, their image can be stored as an SOI [=Subject of Interest]; if they are then seen in that shop again, the shop manager will get an alert.

The SOI database system, she says, subverts our justice system. “How do you know if you’re on the watch list? You’re not guilty of anything, in the legal sense. If there’s proof that you’ve committed a crime, you need to go through the criminal justice system; otherwise we’re in a system of private policing. We’re entering the sphere of pre-crime.”
If enough retailers start using facial-recognition technology before the government takes notice, then we may find that the democratic discussion has been short-circuited already.
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guest · Aug 4, 2019

On the Amazon panopticon
August 4, 2019
https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/04/on-the-amazon-panopticon/

Last year, “Amazon employees met with ICE officials … to market the company’s facial recognition technology,” the ACLU informs us. Amazon VP Brad Huseman later said “We believe the government should have the best available technology.” Then, last month, Motherboard revealed Amazon has partnered with police departments around the country to create “a self-perpetuating surveillance network” of Ring products.

Allow me to be the umpteenth to say: what the hell, Amazon?
The technical concerns are real enough, as shown by Orlando’s cancellation of their pilot Rekognition program.

The question is not really whether Rekognition’s technical problems will be solved. The question is whether marketing it to governments and law enforcement in order to enable ubiquitous panopticon surveillance is good for any society in the world.
It’s dangerously intellectually lazy to say “if it’s legal it must be OK” or “the institutions of democracy will protect us from harm, therefore as a tech maven I don’t need to think or worry about any consequences.”
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guest · Aug 7, 2019

Facial Recognition Is Suddenly Everywhere. Should You Worry?
August 6, 2019
https://www.wired.com/story/facial-recognition-everywhere-should-you-worry/

The accuracy of facial-recognition algorithms has improved significantly in the past few years. That allows you to unlock an iPhone with your face. But the rapid adoption of the technology by government for uses such as airport security and policing has triggered a debate about the algorithms’ trustworthiness and how they are being used.

Three US cities, including San Francisco, recently blocked their agencies from using the technology altogether, while federal lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have expressed interest in regulating facial recognition.
Police and border agencies say using facial recognition helps them catch criminals and fraudsters more efficiently.

“I would rather live in a world where I feel I have some privacy, even in public spaces,” she says. “If people know where you are, you might not do those things that are the bedrock of what we think people in this country should be able to do.”
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guest · Aug 7, 2019

British police to use facial recognition app to identify criminals with a smartphone
August 7, 2019
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technol...se-facial-recognition-app-identify-criminals/

South Wales Police confirmed 50 officers will be given the app in a three month trial. It will allow them to snap a photo of a suspect and analyse it immediately using facial recognition software. An instant alert will then inform them if the subject appears on a list of wanted suspects.
Police and crime commissioner Alun Michael defended the trial, claiming that it was necessary to improve efficiency after severe budget cuts.

South Wales Police also claimed that cases of mistaken identity will be easily resolved without the need for a trip to a police station or custody suite.

"When dealing with a person of interest during their patrols in our communities, officers will be able to access instant, actionable data, allowing to them to identify whether the person stopped is, or is not, the person they need to speak to, without having to return to a police station."
Hannah Couchman, policy and campaigns officer at Liberty [...] She said: "It’s a gross abuse of power for SWP to roll out routine, on-the-spot biometric checks, and especially in circumstances where a person isn’t suspected of committing any crime at all.
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guest · Aug 11, 2019

Summer camps use facial recognition so parents can watch from home
August 10, 2019
https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/tre...cle_dd015621-1727-592b-9bf8-032ea8d14287.html

When David Hiller's two daughters checked into Camp Echo, a bucolic sleep-away camp in Upstate New York, they relinquished their cellphones for seven idyllic weeks away from their digital lives.

But not Hiller: His phone rings 10 times a day with notifications from the summer camp's facial-recognition service, which alerts him whenever one of his girls is photographed enjoying their newfound independence, going water-skiing or making a new friend.
His daughters don't really know about the facial-recognition part, he said.
But for him and his wife, it's quickly become a cherished summer pastime, alerting them instantly when the camp uploads its for-parents haul of more than 1,000 photos a day - many of which they end up looking through, just in case.

Now hundreds of summer camps across the United States have tethered their rustic lakefronts to facial-recognition machines, allowing parents an increasingly omniscient view into their kids' home away from home.

"I love it. I wish I was with them," he said. "But I at least feel like I know what they're doing."
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Facial-recognition software has raised alarms with privacy advocates for its ability to quickly identify people from a distance without their knowledge or consent [...] But while that debate rages, the technology has quietly become an accepted, widespread and even celebrated part of Americans' everyday lives.
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Minimalist · Aug 12, 2019

South Wales Police Slammed for New Facial Recog App

South Wales Police is set to begin a trial of controversial facial recognition technology this month, even as rights groups challenge its legality in the courts.

The police force is reported to be using hardware from NEC and an in-house developed software UI to provide it with a second set of eyes to scan crowds of people and identify those that may be on a watch list.
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https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/wales-police-slammed-new-facial/

guest · Aug 12, 2019

Kings Cross is using facial recognition and Canary Wharf could be next
August 12, 2019
https://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/3080336/kings-cross-facial-recognition

Londoners could find themselves being watched more than ever, as it emerges that one of its most up-and-coming estates is using facial recognition on crowds.
The notoriously shonky technology has rolled out across the whole Kings Cross estate - 67-acres of surveillance - according to a report in the Financial Times.

The recently redeveloped area includes Google's headquarters for the UK, as well as the head office of its AI subsidiary DeepMind. It also encompasses parts of Central St Martins' College, schools and shops.

"These cameras use a number of detection and tracking methods, including facial recognition, but also have sophisticated systems in place to protect the privacy of the general public," said a spokesman.
But it's not just Kings Cross. The report also reveals plans to roll out similar facial recognition tech in the Canary Wharf estate, which could cover even more faces, albeit faces attached to anonymous business attire.
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guest · Aug 12, 2019

mood said: ↑

Kings Cross is using facial recognition and Canary Wharf could be next
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Regulator looking at use of facial recognition at King's Cross site
August 12, 2019
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...use-of-facial-recognition-at-kings-cross-site

The Information Commissioner’s Office warned businesses using the surveillance technology that they needed to demonstrate its use was “strictly necessary and proportionate” and had a clear basis in law.
The data protection regulator added it was “currently looking at the use of facial recognition technology” by the private sector and warned it would “consider taking action where we find non-compliance with the law”.

Hannah Couchman, a policy and campaigns officer from Liberty, said it amounted to “a disturbing expansion of mass surveillance that threatens our privacy and freedom of expression as we go about our everyday lives”. She added: “There has been no transparency about how this tool is being deployed and who it is targeting.”
[...] “it is very difficult to adjudicate in the abstract. They’ve given us very little information as to what they doing.”
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hawki · Aug 13, 2019

"Facial recognition software mistook 1 in 5 California lawmakers for criminals...

About 1 in 5 legislators was erroneously matched to a person who had been arrested when the ACLU used the software to screen their pictures against a database of 25,000 publicly available booking photos. Last year, in a similar experiment done with photos of members of Congress, the software erroneously matched 28 federal legislators with mug shots..."

https://www.latimes.com/california/...-california-lawmakers-for-criminals-says-aclu

guest · Aug 13, 2019

Factbox: From airports to schools to hotels - the spaces scanning faces
August 13, 2019
https://in.reuters.com/article/brit...otels-the-spaces-scanning-faces-idINKCN1V31QO

From speeding up boarding at airports to boosting security at malls and concerts, facial recognition technology has become increasingly pervasive, raising concerns about privacy.
Computers have become adept at identifying people by matching a scan of their facial features against a photograph, but critics say the technology is still prone to errors and could lead to excessive surveillance.

Britain’s data protection watchdog said this week it was looking into use of the technology after reports that a property developer had set up facial recognition cameras in London’s central King’s Cross area.
Here are eight other world locations with facial recognition technology.
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BENGALURU AIRPORT [...] NO. 11 MIDDLE SCHOOL, HANGZHOU [...]
FLYZOO HOTEL, HANGZHOU [...] TOKYO 2020 OLYMPICS [...]
WINTER WONDERLAND, CARDIFF [...] TAYLOR SWIFT CONCERTS [...]
CHANGI AIRPORT, SINGAPORE [...] U.S. BORDER
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guest · Aug 14, 2019

Amazon says its facial recognition tech can now detect fear
August 13, 2019
https://thenextweb.com/security/2019/08/14/amazon-says-facial-recognition-tech-can-now-detect-fear/

Amazon has announced that its facial recognition system can now detect “fear” by reading a person’s face.

“We have improved accuracy for emotion detection — for all seven emotions: ‘Happy,’ ‘Sad,’ ‘Angry,’ ‘Surprised,’ ‘Disgusted,’ ‘Calm,’ and ‘Confused’ — and added a new emotion: ‘Fear,'” the company said.
It’s to be noted that Amazon updated the software last week to be able to detect violent content such as blood, wounds, weapons, self-injury, corpses, as well as sexually explicit content.
The facial recognition debate
While fear could be leveraged for practical security use cases, reading a person’s emotions by their facial features risks mistakenly branding innocents as criminals, not to mention the potential for discriminatory and racial biases. After all, a machine learning software can only be as good as the data it learns from.
Amazon’s ethical dilemma

“Even though our software is being used to identify persons of interest from images provided to the [sheriff’s office], the perception might be that we are constantly checking faces from everything, kind of a Big Brother vibe,” per emails from Oregon police officials.
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Krusty · Aug 14, 2019

mood said: ↑

Amazon says its facial recognition tech can now detect fear
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Fear of facial recognition?

deBoetie · Aug 14, 2019

Krusty said: ↑

Fear of facial recognition?
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Yep, like that guy who tried to hide his face when going past a "voluntary" face recognition trial by the Met Police in London, and got charged when they stopped him and he got lippy.

guest · Aug 14, 2019

#182: Kings Cross is using facial recognition and Canary Wharf could be next
#183: Regulator looking at use of facial recognition at King's Cross site
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London mayor quizzes King's Cross developer on facial recognition
August 14, 2019
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49343822

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has written to the King's Cross Central development asking for reassurance its use of facial-recognition technology is legal.

Argent, the developer of the 67-acre (0.3-sq-km) site, has said facial recognition is being used to "ensure public safety".
But Mr Khan wrote there was "serious and widespread concern" about the legality of facial-recognition cameras.
In his letter to Argent's Robert Evans, the chief executive of the King's Cross development, Mr Khan said public spaces should be "open, free to use and offer the highest level of public access".

He requested more information about how facial recognition cameras were being used, as well as "reassurance that you have been liaising with government ministers and the information commissioner's office (ICO) to ensure its use is fully compliant".
Ben Robson, a partner at Oury Clark solicitors, said using facial recognition was a "high-risk" option for businesses, given the privacy implications the technology presented.
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Minimalist · Aug 14, 2019

Amazon's Rekognition falsely matched lawmakers to criminals... again, ACLU says

The American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California says facial recognition technology isn't ready to be used for law enforcement. This comes after a test of Amazon's Rekognition software wrongly flagged 26 California lawmakers as criminals, according to the ACLU.
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https://www.cnet.com/news/amazons-r...tched-lawmakers-to-criminals-again-aclu-says/

guest · Aug 15, 2019

Data regulator probes King's Cross facial recognition tech
August 15, 2019
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49357759

Media exposure of live facial recognition at the site prompted the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) to look into how it was being used.
The ICO will inspect the technology in place and how it is operated to ensure it does not break data protection laws.

The regulator said it was "deeply concerned" about the growing use of facial-recognition technology.
In its statement, the ICO said: "Scanning people's faces as they lawfully go about their daily lives, in order to identify them, is a potential threat to privacy that should concern us all."

"Put simply, any organisations wanting to use facial recognition technology must comply with the law - and they must do so in a fair, transparent and accountable way," said the ICO.
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ICO: Statement: Live facial recognition technology in King's Cross

guest · Aug 15, 2019

The fashion line designed to trick surveillance cameras
August 14, 2019
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...n-line-designed-to-trick-surveillance-cameras

The anti-surveillance garments were revealed at the DefCon cybersecurity conference in Las Vegas on Saturday by the hacker and fashion designer Kate Rose, who presented the inaugural collection of her Adversarial Fashion line.

The intention is to make deploying that sort of surveillance less effective, more expensive, and harder to use without human oversight, in order to slow down the transition to what Rose calls “visual personally identifying data collection”.
The anti-ALPR fabric is just the latest example of “adversarial fashion”, albeit the first to be targeted against car trackers.
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guest · Aug 16, 2019

Investigation finds facial recognition 'epidemic' across British shopping centres and museums
August 16, 2019
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technol...s-facial-recognition-epidemic-across-british/

Facial recognition technology is being used across shopping centres, museums and conference venues around the UK in what privacy groups have warned is an "epidemic".

An investigation by Big Brother Watch found live facial recognition technology, where images of people are transmitted from a live camera feed and matched to a database, had been used in "secret police trials" in Sheffield's Meadowhall last year, which it claimed scanned as many as 2 million visitors' faces.
The privacy group said the Millennium Point conference centre in Birmingham had also used surveillance.

The World Museum in Liverpool was named in the report as well, for scanning people's faces during the "China’s First Emperor and the Terracotta Warriors" exhibition last year.
Silkie Carlo, the director of Big Brother Watch, said the collaboration between "police and private companies in building these surveillance nets around popular spaces is deeply disturbing".
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Big Brother Watch: Facial Recognition ‘Epidemic’ in the UK

Stefan Froberg · Aug 16, 2019

Minimalist said: ↑

Amazon's Rekognition falsely matched lawmakers to criminals... again, ACLU says

https://www.cnet.com/news/amazons-r...tched-lawmakers-to-criminals-again-aclu-says/
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The ACLU tweeted about the test on Tuesday, saying the software matched 1 in 5 lawmakers to the mugshot of someone who'd been arrested. The test compared legislators' images with a database of 25,000 publicly available mugshots. The ACLU of Northern California also released an image of all the lawmakers it says the Rekognition system erroneously flagged at criminals.
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That's a horrible result!
4 in 5 would have been more accurate ...

Minimalist · Aug 16, 2019

Stefan Froberg said: ↑

That's a horrible result!
4 in 5 would have been more accurate ...

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Hehehe, but then they would outlaw it

guest · Aug 18, 2019

Manchester City warned against using facial recognition on fans
Campaigners say scanning faces as alternative to tickets would be intrusive
August 18, 2019
https://www.theguardian.com/technol...e-calls-to-reconsider-facial-recognition-tech

The reigning Premier League champions are considering introducing technology allowing fans to get into the Etihad Stadium more quickly by showing their faces instead of tickets, according to the Sunday Times.

If someone is recognised as having bought a ticket, they would be ushered in by a green light, and if not they would be halted with a yellow one.

“It’s alarming that fans will be sharing deeply sensitive personal information with a private company that boasts about collecting and sharing data on each person that walks through the gate, and using this to deny people entry. Manchester City should urgently reconsider their involvement in normalising a mass surveillance tool which can track and monitor us as we go about our everyday lives.”
Blink Identity, a Texas-based facial recognition company, says its technology can identify people walking at regular speed, so fans will not need to slow down to show a ticket or use a turnstile.
To opt in, supporters would need to register a selfie taken on their phone. Blink Identity says it is also possible to “collect usable and sharable data” on every person that walks through its facial scanning software.
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guest · Aug 18, 2019

Darwin council promises not to use facial recognition technology in new CCTV cameras
August 19, 2019
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08...cognition-technology-raises-concerns/11425822

As part of the Switching On Darwin project, 138 new CCTV cameras — as well as public Wi-Fi, new lighting, and sensors — were installed across the city centre.
A federal Department of Infrastructure spokesperson said "[facial] recognition capabilities were only included in this grant agreement because it was part of Darwin City Council's grant application" .

Josh Sattler, the council's general manager for innovation and growth, added the cameras would be used for things such as vehicle counting, but not facial recognition.

"Yes, they have [facial recognition] capability but it's not something we're using … we don't see a situation where we will require that," he said.
Earlier this month, the council announced it had hired a consultant to carry out a privacy impact assessment on all the new technology, with the investigation likely be completed in the next six months
She welcomed the Darwin council's decision to conduct a privacy assessment, but said conducting it after the technology was deployed was not best practice.

"It's concerning that the privacy impact assessment is only being done after the system is already installed and already in use," she said.
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guest · Aug 18, 2019

Bernie Sanders wants to ban facial recognition use by police
August 18, 2019
https://venturebeat.com/2019/08/18/bernie-sanders-wants-to-ban-facial-recognition-use-by-police/

Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) wants to put an end to police use of facial recognition software. Sanders called for the ban as part of a criminal justice reform plan introduced today ahead of a two-day tour of South Carolina.

In recent months, cities like San Francisco and Somerville, Massachusetts have passed laws banning police and city department use of facial recognition software on the grounds of racial justice, privacy, and fears of misuse.
At the same time, police departments in places like Chicago and Detroit are exploring the use of real-time facial recognition with a web of cameras across the city.

A range of policy experts and researchers have urged Congress to take action regulating law enforcement use of facial recognition software.
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guest · Aug 19, 2019

today, i went back from a trip, was in a resort located in a island, all there was powered by facial recognition (speedboat access, etc...); i didn't have to carry (and eventually lose) any ID/passport to access the facilities, and no outsiders could get in, worth 100 times any other systems.

guest · Aug 19, 2019

King's Cross investor seeks facial recognition answers
August 19, 2019
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49394788

A key investor in London's King's Cross development has told the BBC that it is trying to find out more detail about how facial recognition is being used in the area.

The BT Pension Scheme (BTPS) bankrolled the site alongside an Australian fund, which owns a majority stake.
It follows the UK's data protection watchdog and the mayor of London in seeking more information from the zone's developer Argent.

"We are looking into the reported use of facial recognition at King's Cross and take this issue very seriously," a statement issued by Hermes Investment Management, on behalf of BTPS, said.
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