7 ms·

Facial Recognition Software Moves from Overseas Wars to Local Police

73 points by aethertap 11y ago

fapjacks 11y ago
Surprise!
- msandford 11y ago
  Slippery slope argument, meet Reality. Reality, this is Slippery slope!
  - fapjacks 11y ago
    Apparently you don't know many police officers. This, in fact, was inevitable, following specifically from the circumstance that many police officers are also reserve soldiers and spent time in Iraq and Afghanistan using those tools. I'd estimate the vast majority of law enforcement organizations in the US have personnel that are also in the reserves or guard. I deployed with many police officers, and heard many of those police officers talk specifically about getting a hold of these biometrics tools for use in law enforcement back home. You're right that not everyone shares my somewhat unique perspective, and so to those who have no relationship with police officers and are therefore ignorant of the facts, it may seem fallacious. And also it's fun to make those quippy accusations, so I understand the impulse.
    - marincounty 11y ago
      Personally, I kinda of tired of veterans thinking they would be great cops when their tour ends! I was told by a Cop friend that what matters is still how well you do on the written, physical tests, and the Psy. Evaluation. They do like some college, and civilian experience. Military experience is not seeked out like it was in the past. Being a soldier and being a Cop are take different skill sets. I don't want to get into all the differances, and I don't want to argue with anyone, but I'll take a shy security guard, over a "gung ho" guy who wants to see some action? Our streets are not the streets of Iraq, or Afganistan. I have the highest regard for any ex-military. I think you guys/ladies should get first shot at any federal job--including jobs that involve public safety. I think most of you know by now that being veterans doesn't mean much to most civilian police departments in the hiring process. It should because you served your country, and need a job when you get home. Most of you are intelligent enough to realize civilian police departments should not be run like military operations. I do cringe when I hear, usually ex-marines talk/think they will be shoe-ins when they get home and apply to the academy. (I hope you guys don't take this wrong way, but I think most you know what I'm getting at?). Meaning--war is vastly different than basically revenue collection, and dealing with the public! Yes--most departments are still training officers in a military fashion, but that's been changing. Hopefully, it will change quicker? The more progressive departments are changing training procedures as I write this, at least that's what I heard. One of the biggest reasons, I was told was the proliferation of lawsuits that are being levied against aggressive, illegial police tactics, and cameras are Everywhere. The days of coverups/"Blue code of Honor" are over, for the most part. My friend said they are over. I haven't seen much of a change yet.
      - fapjacks 11y ago
        No, your perspective is absolutely the right one: It is critically imperative that we separate warzones from domestic law enforcement in every way possible. I personally believe that combat vets should not be allowed to serve as police officers. Security guards? Sure. Bodyguards? Sure. Law enforcement? No. That's my personal opinion, because it should not be normal to flashbang a building, kick the door in, and rush inside with weapons drawn. But that's how American police departments are beginning to serve warrants for traffic violations. And it doesn't end there, but in particular that distinction is incredibly important. You hit the nail on the head and I could not possibly agree with you more.
    - msandford 11y ago
      > This, in fact, was inevitable Agreed! This is a perfect example of people arguing "slippery slope!!" when the tech first came out and getting shouted down repeatedly. Now they're being vindicated, as it's absolutely happening exactly as predicted. My point is that the slippery slope argument is often used and no matter how many times people say it's invalid or unlikely, is often right.
      - fapjacks 11y ago
        I completely misinterpreted your comment. I read your comment as saying that I was guilty of the fallacy. You're right, though, it seems people are quick to make this kind of argument about this issue, as though we're supposed to believe that our police forces aren't being militarized.
    - woodman 11y ago
      Your perspective is not very unique, there are a lot of veterans due to high churn. It is my experience that there is very little crossover between the military and police. Of the hundred-something guys in my last company, only two went on to law enforcement. A few years ago I had a nonmilitary friend go through one of the country's top police academies, and his stories aligned with my experiences - there weren't a lot of veterans in his class. The local PD has 120 officers, of that only two are veterans (neither of them were combat arms). I have my theories about why this is, but that is another discussion. So the whole narrative, where police militarization is due to veteran hires, rings pretty hollow for me. What we are seeing here is the result of an end-justifies-the-means mentality. The military has the same mentality, but this is very deliberately tempered by a focus on honor and duty - something that law enforcement lacks by comparison.
      - fapjacks 11y ago
        That's interesting. What was your MOS? In the infantry, we had a much higher ratio of police officers, and I was in a few different units which had higher ratios than yours. In my last company alone we had -- roughly estimating here -- fifteen or twenty law enforcement officers of various kinds.
        woodman 11y ago
        0331, infantry machine gunner. We saw a lot of combat in Fallujah, which might have taken the starch out of most. There is also the timing to consider, 01 to 05 were interesting years for the military - a very large injection of middle and upper middle class folks.
        fapjacks 11y ago
        Maybe there are more police officers are in the Army than the Marines. It is definitely a significant demographic in line units in the Army guard and reserves. FWIW we had the opposite happen: When I joined in 2000, there were a lot of college kids and middleupper-middle class people. After the wars started, it was basically people coming off of active duty to serve the rest of their 8 years (four active, four guard/reserve), poor people that couldn't afford college otherwise (myself included) and law enforcement. There was an enormous shift, and a kind of unspoken understanding before Iraq that anybody that didn't want to be in combat needed to get out. And so they found ways -- like PT tests and paperwork (and I suppose drug tests and DUIs) -- to get out.
pjc50 11y ago
The Metropolitan Police have had "forward intelligence teams" (FIT) filming demonstrations for some time in order to identify people. Note that, as people are increasingly demanding that police wear body cameras to record evidence of possible police abuse, these cameras can also be fed to image recognition systems.
- willyt 11y ago
  I heard from a colleague who went on a tour of a CCTV control centre in London that it was being used on surveillance camera live streams at least 15 years ago.
  - pjc50 11y ago
    I can believe it, although I can also believe it not working very well with pre-HD cameras and 2000s machine vision. Presumably it's part of the ""ring of steel""?
    - therobot24 11y ago
      Unconstrained face recognition from NIR sensors (often used in CCTVs) is studied substantially less than on images acquired from visible light sensors (for obvious reasons). There's a few face recognition datasets (e.g., SCFace, MBGC Portal Challenge) that aimed to change this, but it still far from meeting the same accuracies we see from Google/Facebook.
- cryoshon 11y ago
  Ah yes, so they can put that we have attended demonstrations into "our file" which will be trotted out against us if we ever decide to run for office. Also, they can easily tag us for arrest because we attended a protest, then pick us up at some point in the future, avoiding messy riots or icky looking violent arrests. What a great time we are being set up for. I wonder if the anti-recognition camo patches are done yet?
mangeletti 11y ago
Minority Report, here we come. Incrementalism is a powerful tool for exerting an unstoppable force onto something which would otherwise notice that force and resist it.
- therobot24 11y ago
  on another note, would you want police to not implement tools that improve the success rate of finding those with outstanding warrants?
  - code_duck 11y ago
    It depends whether those warrants are for offenses like armed robbery and rape or drug offenses and parking tickets.
    - logfromblammo 11y ago
      Or sedition and lese majesty. This technology can be used to enforce laws hostile to the masses as well as it can help enforce laws friendly to us. Since we do not control it, it will inevitably be used for both. In areas where violent and property crimes are high, it will be a blessing. In places where law enforcement is used mainly for supplementing municipal revenue, it will be a curse. And where the government uses the law as a weapon against dissent, it will be a nightmare.
      - therobot24 11y ago
        >> In areas where violent and property crimes are high, it will be a blessing. In places where law enforcement is used mainly for supplementing municipal revenue, it will be a curse. And where the government uses the law as a weapon against dissent, it will be a nightmare. This is true of almost any police tool. I mean you can apply to guns, pepper spray, probable cause, etc. As a blanket statement reply: It really comes down to implementation and training. Really though, i'm not arguing for or against face recognition in local law enforcement. As a biometrics researcher i love to see real applications that actually work for the community, but as someone who disagrees with mass collections, outside of the obvious, such as a license photo or voluntary admittance to a NEXUS/TSA pre-check/Global Entry program, i worry.
PerilousD 11y ago
The technology is agnostic and can be used in ways not originally envisioned. What happens when every police appearance is captured and then run through say social media scans for 'ID' purposes?
- romaniv 11y ago
  So, let's say you do that. Then what?
romaniv 11y ago
> Facial recognition software, which American military and intelligence agencies used for years in Iraq and Afghanistan Mighty good it did them there... It's disturbing that no matter how much technology police gets, they always seem to want more. I mean, look at the encryption backdoor debate. We're being monitored in all ways imaginable, and apparently it's still not enough.
- AndrewKemendo 11y ago
  Mighty good it did them there... What is your measure of success? In fact, the field biometrics system worked really well for human network mapping - which was it's intended purpose. We defeated a lot of IED networks in part because of this tool.
  - cryoshon 11y ago
    Political success. Tactical and strategic success are usually a necessary but not sufficient condition.
    - AndrewKemendo 11y ago
      That's my point though. You can't say that the overall effort failed, therefore all of the pieces must be worthless. The success of GWOT was not based on biometrics collection capabilities.
  - thatcat 11y ago
    Yes, we also completed our research and development of the technology. So that like all Military tech, it can be gifted to US Law Enforcement. The war was just a beta test for biometerics and served as the only justifiable pretext for the development of this tech. Most of its utility will be in the civilian sphere. Inevitably, they'll be scanning your face every time you buy a beer.
nerdcity 11y ago
People asking for body cameras on all police, whether net benefit or not, need to understand everything that is coming with it. That includes automatic facial identification of everyone. Police will simply no longer have to ask for ID. Obscuring your face is already being made illegal... (see: burqa bans)
- angersock 11y ago
  Your's is an excellent point that gets lost in the shuffle. On the bright side, as long as we keep underfunding police forces, maybe that reduces the surveillance apparatus? </sarcasm>
- therobot24 11y ago
  So i looked up burqa bans and found this: http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-burqa-ban/ http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-bur... which basically only has 2 European countries banning it nationally, and just a few more who implement local bans or have attempted to ban it. Provided the constitutional religious freedoms we have in the US, it seems very unlikely that a similar ban would pass here. In terms of obscuring your face, there are anti-mask laws, but they really pertain to protests/riots. I'm not suggesting that the ban is good, or other countries will not follow suit, however it just seems like quite a jump to make - because 6 countries have some form of a ban on a burqa we have to watch out for face recognition. Should we not wear a cross if we're Christian because Syria persecutes Jehovah’s Witnesses?
  - nerdcity 11y ago
    http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-burqa-ban/ http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-bur... In 2011, France went even further, forbidding concealment of people’s face in public—through a burqa, niqab (a version of the veil that leaves a slot for a woman’s eyes), but also masks or balaclavas http://www.connexionfrance.com/cctv-video-surveillance-protection-paris-nice-france-privacy-11483-news-article.html http://www.connexionfrance.com/cctv-video-surveillance-prote... President Sarkozy wants 2011 to be the year that "vidéoprotection" goes mainstream, and has set a target of 60,000 cameras watching public spaces around the country by the end of this year, up from the current 20,000.
ck2 11y ago
When I read that soldiers were forcing Iraqi civilians to do iris scans several years ago, I knew that eventually we'd see police in the USA doing the same thing here.
- cryoshon 11y ago
  The concerning thing is that our police here seem to think that they are soldiers who are in Iraq. They also fail to recognize that scanning large swaths of civilians breeds intense resentment from an already hostile population and ends up causing more support for the insurgency. Knowing American cops, I can't envision an iris scan being committed without some snarky negging from the officer.
whoopdedo 11y ago
And the federal RealID program provides a nice comprehensive dataset to train the computers with. This is the veiled motivation behind ID laws that are being promoted as protecting the public from terrorists, sex offenders, or voter fraud. But what the US government really wants is to introduce a loophole in the 4th amendment by outsourcing policing. It's not an illegal search if it's done by a private company. And they don't have to respond to FOIA requests either.
- therobot24 11y ago
  Based on what is in Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAL_ID_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAL_ID_Act), i don't see any provisions mandating everyone having a government ID from the RealID program. Rather, "sets requirements for state driver's licenses and ID cards to be accepted by the federal government for 'official purposes'". Also the mandated IDs for 'voter fraud' were largely a political ploy to prevent certain people from voting, not to collect information. Maybe take off the tinfoil once in awhile.
dharma1 11y ago
time to start rocking these https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRj8whKmN1M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRj8whKmN1M
- therobot24 11y ago
  From the video it looks like they're just preventing face detection (probably using OpenCVs implementation of Viola Jones), though i don't think an actual recognition system would do much better when provided a picture of you with lights shining in the middle of your face. For most systems, a combination of a hat, scarf, and sunglasses will work just fine (but keep in mind, if the system uses NIR sensors then sunglasses won't work - they only block UV light).
  - dharma1 11y ago
    yep that's why the glasses use IR lights - invisible to the naked eye but visible/distracting to sensors
ilurk 11y ago
IRL privacy cat and mouse game. There is already some work in the privacy clothing area. Almost makes it look like items for a sci-fi RPG. http://www.pcworld.com/article/2969732/privacy/how-japans-privacy-visor-fools-facerecognition-cameras.html http://www.pcworld.com/article/2969732/privacy/how-japans-pr... If you’re worried about Big Brother monitoring you from security cameras, Japan has developed eyewear that can keep you anonymous. The Privacy Visor consists of a lightweight, wraparound, semitransparent plastic sheet fitted over eyewear frames. It’s bulky and not exactly stylish, but it could have customized designs. It’s meant to thwart face-recognition camera systems through a very simple trick. It reflects overhead light into the camera lens, causing the area around the eyes to appear much brighter than it normally does. http://ahprojects.com/projects/stealth-wear/ http://ahprojects.com/projects/stealth-wear/ Building off previous work with CV Dazzle, camouflage from face detection, Stealth Wear continues to explore the aesthetics of privacy and the potential for fashion to challenge authoritarian surveillance. Presented by Primitive at Tank Magazine were a suite of new designs that tackle some of the most pressing and sophisticated forms of surveillance today. The countersurveillance solutions include a series of ‘Anti-Drone’ garments and the Off Pocket™, a privacy accessory that allows you to instantly zero out your phone’s signal. How long until they're outlawed just like encryption will. edit: is there any proper way to easily quote text? So that it stays text wrapped.
- therobot24 11y ago
  I would actually love to see how well CV Dazzle and the Privacy Visor work against Google/Facebook's system. Heck, even on my own systems.
- DanBC 11y ago
  > edit: is there any proper way to easily quote text? So that it stays text wrapped Don't put four spaces in front of quoted text. Just use some quote-indicator character. Most people on HN use >, but anything is fine so long as it's clear what you're quoting.

73 points by aethertap 11y ago

fapjacks 11y ago

Surprise!

msandford 11y ago
Slippery slope argument, meet Reality. Reality, this is Slippery slope!
- fapjacks 11y ago
  Apparently you don't know many police officers. This, in fact, was inevitable, following specifically from the circumstance that many police officers are also reserve soldiers and spent time in Iraq and Afghanistan using those tools. I'd estimate the vast majority of law enforcement organizations in the US have personnel that are also in the reserves or guard. I deployed with many police officers, and heard many of those police officers talk specifically about getting a hold of these biometrics tools for use in law enforcement back home. You're right that not everyone shares my somewhat unique perspective, and so to those who have no relationship with police officers and are therefore ignorant of the facts, it may seem fallacious. And also it's fun to make those quippy accusations, so I understand the impulse.
  - marincounty 11y ago
    Personally, I kinda of tired of veterans thinking they would be great cops when their tour ends! I was told by a Cop friend that what matters is still how well you do on the written, physical tests, and the Psy. Evaluation. They do like some college, and civilian experience. Military experience is not seeked out like it was in the past. Being a soldier and being a Cop are take different skill sets. I don't want to get into all the differances, and I don't want to argue with anyone, but I'll take a shy security guard, over a "gung ho" guy who wants to see some action? Our streets are not the streets of Iraq, or Afganistan. I have the highest regard for any ex-military. I think you guys/ladies should get first shot at any federal job--including jobs that involve public safety. I think most of you know by now that being veterans doesn't mean much to most civilian police departments in the hiring process. It should because you served your country, and need a job when you get home. Most of you are intelligent enough to realize civilian police departments should not be run like military operations. I do cringe when I hear, usually ex-marines talk/think they will be shoe-ins when they get home and apply to the academy. (I hope you guys don't take this wrong way, but I think most you know what I'm getting at?). Meaning--war is vastly different than basically revenue collection, and dealing with the public! Yes--most departments are still training officers in a military fashion, but that's been changing. Hopefully, it will change quicker? The more progressive departments are changing training procedures as I write this, at least that's what I heard. One of the biggest reasons, I was told was the proliferation of lawsuits that are being levied against aggressive, illegial police tactics, and cameras are Everywhere. The days of coverups/"Blue code of Honor" are over, for the most part. My friend said they are over. I haven't seen much of a change yet.
    - fapjacks 11y ago
      No, your perspective is absolutely the right one: It is critically imperative that we separate warzones from domestic law enforcement in every way possible. I personally believe that combat vets should not be allowed to serve as police officers. Security guards? Sure. Bodyguards? Sure. Law enforcement? No. That's my personal opinion, because it should not be normal to flashbang a building, kick the door in, and rush inside with weapons drawn. But that's how American police departments are beginning to serve warrants for traffic violations. And it doesn't end there, but in particular that distinction is incredibly important. You hit the nail on the head and I could not possibly agree with you more.
  - msandford 11y ago
    > This, in fact, was inevitable Agreed! This is a perfect example of people arguing "slippery slope!!" when the tech first came out and getting shouted down repeatedly. Now they're being vindicated, as it's absolutely happening exactly as predicted. My point is that the slippery slope argument is often used and no matter how many times people say it's invalid or unlikely, is often right.
    - fapjacks 11y ago
      I completely misinterpreted your comment. I read your comment as saying that I was guilty of the fallacy. You're right, though, it seems people are quick to make this kind of argument about this issue, as though we're supposed to believe that our police forces aren't being militarized.
  - woodman 11y ago
    Your perspective is not very unique, there are a lot of veterans due to high churn. It is my experience that there is very little crossover between the military and police. Of the hundred-something guys in my last company, only two went on to law enforcement. A few years ago I had a nonmilitary friend go through one of the country's top police academies, and his stories aligned with my experiences - there weren't a lot of veterans in his class. The local PD has 120 officers, of that only two are veterans (neither of them were combat arms). I have my theories about why this is, but that is another discussion. So the whole narrative, where police militarization is due to veteran hires, rings pretty hollow for me. What we are seeing here is the result of an end-justifies-the-means mentality. The military has the same mentality, but this is very deliberately tempered by a focus on honor and duty - something that law enforcement lacks by comparison.
    - fapjacks 11y ago
      That's interesting. What was your MOS? In the infantry, we had a much higher ratio of police officers, and I was in a few different units which had higher ratios than yours. In my last company alone we had -- roughly estimating here -- fifteen or twenty law enforcement officers of various kinds.
      - woodman 11y ago
        0331, infantry machine gunner. We saw a lot of combat in Fallujah, which might have taken the starch out of most. There is also the timing to consider, 01 to 05 were interesting years for the military - a very large injection of middle and upper middle class folks.
        fapjacks 11y ago
        Maybe there are more police officers are in the Army than the Marines. It is definitely a significant demographic in line units in the Army guard and reserves. FWIW we had the opposite happen: When I joined in 2000, there were a lot of college kids and middleupper-middle class people. After the wars started, it was basically people coming off of active duty to serve the rest of their 8 years (four active, four guard/reserve), poor people that couldn't afford college otherwise (myself included) and law enforcement. There was an enormous shift, and a kind of unspoken understanding before Iraq that anybody that didn't want to be in combat needed to get out. And so they found ways -- like PT tests and paperwork (and I suppose drug tests and DUIs) -- to get out.

pjc50 11y ago

The Metropolitan Police have had "forward intelligence teams" (FIT) filming demonstrations for some time in order to identify people. Note that, as people are increasingly demanding that police wear body cameras to record evidence of possible police abuse, these cameras can also be fed to image recognition systems.

willyt 11y ago
I heard from a colleague who went on a tour of a CCTV control centre in London that it was being used on surveillance camera live streams at least 15 years ago.
- pjc50 11y ago
  I can believe it, although I can also believe it not working very well with pre-HD cameras and 2000s machine vision. Presumably it's part of the ""ring of steel""?
  - therobot24 11y ago
    Unconstrained face recognition from NIR sensors (often used in CCTVs) is studied substantially less than on images acquired from visible light sensors (for obvious reasons). There's a few face recognition datasets (e.g., SCFace, MBGC Portal Challenge) that aimed to change this, but it still far from meeting the same accuracies we see from Google/Facebook.
cryoshon 11y ago
Ah yes, so they can put that we have attended demonstrations into "our file" which will be trotted out against us if we ever decide to run for office. Also, they can easily tag us for arrest because we attended a protest, then pick us up at some point in the future, avoiding messy riots or icky looking violent arrests. What a great time we are being set up for. I wonder if the anti-recognition camo patches are done yet?

mangeletti 11y ago

Minority Report, here we come. Incrementalism is a powerful tool for exerting an unstoppable force onto something which would otherwise notice that force and resist it.

therobot24 11y ago
on another note, would you want police to not implement tools that improve the success rate of finding those with outstanding warrants?
- code_duck 11y ago
  It depends whether those warrants are for offenses like armed robbery and rape or drug offenses and parking tickets.
  - logfromblammo 11y ago
    Or sedition and lese majesty. This technology can be used to enforce laws hostile to the masses as well as it can help enforce laws friendly to us. Since we do not control it, it will inevitably be used for both. In areas where violent and property crimes are high, it will be a blessing. In places where law enforcement is used mainly for supplementing municipal revenue, it will be a curse. And where the government uses the law as a weapon against dissent, it will be a nightmare.
    - therobot24 11y ago
      >> In areas where violent and property crimes are high, it will be a blessing. In places where law enforcement is used mainly for supplementing municipal revenue, it will be a curse. And where the government uses the law as a weapon against dissent, it will be a nightmare. This is true of almost any police tool. I mean you can apply to guns, pepper spray, probable cause, etc. As a blanket statement reply: It really comes down to implementation and training. Really though, i'm not arguing for or against face recognition in local law enforcement. As a biometrics researcher i love to see real applications that actually work for the community, but as someone who disagrees with mass collections, outside of the obvious, such as a license photo or voluntary admittance to a NEXUS/TSA pre-check/Global Entry program, i worry.

PerilousD 11y ago

The technology is agnostic and can be used in ways not originally envisioned. What happens when every police appearance is captured and then run through say social media scans for 'ID' purposes?

romaniv 11y ago
So, let's say you do that. Then what?

romaniv 11y ago

> Facial recognition software, which American military and intelligence agencies used for years in Iraq and Afghanistan Mighty good it did them there... It's disturbing that no matter how much technology police gets, they always seem to want more. I mean, look at the encryption backdoor debate. We're being monitored in all ways imaginable, and apparently it's still not enough.

AndrewKemendo 11y ago
Mighty good it did them there... What is your measure of success? In fact, the field biometrics system worked really well for human network mapping - which was it's intended purpose. We defeated a lot of IED networks in part because of this tool.
- cryoshon 11y ago
  Political success. Tactical and strategic success are usually a necessary but not sufficient condition.
  - AndrewKemendo 11y ago
    That's my point though. You can't say that the overall effort failed, therefore all of the pieces must be worthless. The success of GWOT was not based on biometrics collection capabilities.
- thatcat 11y ago
  Yes, we also completed our research and development of the technology. So that like all Military tech, it can be gifted to US Law Enforcement. The war was just a beta test for biometerics and served as the only justifiable pretext for the development of this tech. Most of its utility will be in the civilian sphere. Inevitably, they'll be scanning your face every time you buy a beer.

nerdcity 11y ago

People asking for body cameras on all police, whether net benefit or not, need to understand everything that is coming with it. That includes automatic facial identification of everyone. Police will simply no longer have to ask for ID. Obscuring your face is already being made illegal... (see: burqa bans)

angersock 11y ago
Your's is an excellent point that gets lost in the shuffle. On the bright side, as long as we keep underfunding police forces, maybe that reduces the surveillance apparatus? </sarcasm>
therobot24 11y ago
So i looked up burqa bans and found this: http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-burqa-ban/ http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-bur... which basically only has 2 European countries banning it nationally, and just a few more who implement local bans or have attempted to ban it. Provided the constitutional religious freedoms we have in the US, it seems very unlikely that a similar ban would pass here. In terms of obscuring your face, there are anti-mask laws, but they really pertain to protests/riots. I'm not suggesting that the ban is good, or other countries will not follow suit, however it just seems like quite a jump to make - because 6 countries have some form of a ban on a burqa we have to watch out for face recognition. Should we not wear a cross if we're Christian because Syria persecutes Jehovah’s Witnesses?
- nerdcity 11y ago
  http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-burqa-ban/ http://qz.com/326086/the-places-in-the-world-that-have-a-bur... In 2011, France went even further, forbidding concealment of people’s face in public—through a burqa, niqab (a version of the veil that leaves a slot for a woman’s eyes), but also masks or balaclavas http://www.connexionfrance.com/cctv-video-surveillance-protection-paris-nice-france-privacy-11483-news-article.html http://www.connexionfrance.com/cctv-video-surveillance-prote... President Sarkozy wants 2011 to be the year that "vidéoprotection" goes mainstream, and has set a target of 60,000 cameras watching public spaces around the country by the end of this year, up from the current 20,000.

ck2 11y ago

When I read that soldiers were forcing Iraqi civilians to do iris scans several years ago, I knew that eventually we'd see police in the USA doing the same thing here.

cryoshon 11y ago
The concerning thing is that our police here seem to think that they are soldiers who are in Iraq. They also fail to recognize that scanning large swaths of civilians breeds intense resentment from an already hostile population and ends up causing more support for the insurgency. Knowing American cops, I can't envision an iris scan being committed without some snarky negging from the officer.

whoopdedo 11y ago

And the federal RealID program provides a nice comprehensive dataset to train the computers with. This is the veiled motivation behind ID laws that are being promoted as protecting the public from terrorists, sex offenders, or voter fraud. But what the US government really wants is to introduce a loophole in the 4th amendment by outsourcing policing. It's not an illegal search if it's done by a private company. And they don't have to respond to FOIA requests either.

therobot24 11y ago
Based on what is in Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAL_ID_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAL_ID_Act), i don't see any provisions mandating everyone having a government ID from the RealID program. Rather, "sets requirements for state driver's licenses and ID cards to be accepted by the federal government for 'official purposes'". Also the mandated IDs for 'voter fraud' were largely a political ploy to prevent certain people from voting, not to collect information. Maybe take off the tinfoil once in awhile.

dharma1 11y ago

time to start rocking these https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRj8whKmN1M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRj8whKmN1M

therobot24 11y ago
From the video it looks like they're just preventing face detection (probably using OpenCVs implementation of Viola Jones), though i don't think an actual recognition system would do much better when provided a picture of you with lights shining in the middle of your face. For most systems, a combination of a hat, scarf, and sunglasses will work just fine (but keep in mind, if the system uses NIR sensors then sunglasses won't work - they only block UV light).
- dharma1 11y ago
  yep that's why the glasses use IR lights - invisible to the naked eye but visible/distracting to sensors

ilurk 11y ago

IRL privacy cat and mouse game. There is already some work in the privacy clothing area. Almost makes it look like items for a sci-fi RPG. http://www.pcworld.com/article/2969732/privacy/how-japans-privacy-visor-fools-facerecognition-cameras.html http://www.pcworld.com/article/2969732/privacy/how-japans-pr... If you’re worried about Big Brother monitoring you from security cameras, Japan has developed eyewear that can keep you anonymous. The Privacy Visor consists of a lightweight, wraparound, semitransparent plastic sheet fitted over eyewear frames. It’s bulky and not exactly stylish, but it could have customized designs. It’s meant to thwart face-recognition camera systems through a very simple trick. It reflects overhead light into the camera lens, causing the area around the eyes to appear much brighter than it normally does. http://ahprojects.com/projects/stealth-wear/ http://ahprojects.com/projects/stealth-wear/ Building off previous work with CV Dazzle, camouflage from face detection, Stealth Wear continues to explore the aesthetics of privacy and the potential for fashion to challenge authoritarian surveillance. Presented by Primitive at Tank Magazine were a suite of new designs that tackle some of the most pressing and sophisticated forms of surveillance today. The countersurveillance solutions include a series of ‘Anti-Drone’ garments and the Off Pocket™, a privacy accessory that allows you to instantly zero out your phone’s signal. How long until they're outlawed just like encryption will. edit: is there any proper way to easily quote text? So that it stays text wrapped.

therobot24 11y ago
I would actually love to see how well CV Dazzle and the Privacy Visor work against Google/Facebook's system. Heck, even on my own systems.
DanBC 11y ago
> edit: is there any proper way to easily quote text? So that it stays text wrapped Don't put four spaces in front of quoted text. Just use some quote-indicator character. Most people on HN use >, but anything is fine so long as it's clear what you're quoting.