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I'm more surprised that people are surprised. You provide images to the public with your name and face connected to even more personal data. Why are you surpri

I'm more surprised that people are surprised. You provide images to the public with your name and face connected to even more personal data. Why are you surprised that this data can then be used by a third, or even a fourth party?

noja 11y ago
They're not surprised by that. They are surprised when one of the rules that has held true for the eternity of cities: that you can be semi-anonymous in a crowd, is no longer true.
- Karlozkiller 11y ago
  In my opinion you still can. What makes this possible? You need a database linking images to names, as well as the face-recognition data. People are freely giving away the images for the database linking it all to further personal data. If they did not do this, creating such a database would still be a massive surveillance effort, albeit probably still possible if someone really wanted to do it and had the sufficient resources. I say it's still possible to stay anonymous if you want to.
  - WireWrap 11y ago
    Various businesses have a "take pictures of customers" policy. Medical offices are one example, due to insurance fraud they say. They typically don't ask. They simply tell the customer that they are about to take a picture and it is over before they know it. When I spot such a camera I stand to the side so they have to ask me to move in front of the camera. Which is when I politely refuse to participate. They don't like that very much. Last time, the person made a "well you might not be able to refuse next time" remark. He may be correct, or not, we'll see. These are cases where the images should never be uploaded to a public database or shared with any other parties. However, given the increasing use of SaaS and cloud providers, exposure to some third-parties is highly likely. Any consumer information hitting the cloud is at high risk of abuse. In addition to those scenarios you have cameras behind ATMs, cameras embedded within grocery store self-checkout lines, etc and so forth. It has already become difficult to control your image and, in some cases, prevent that image from being combined with other personally identifiable information.
    - type0 11y ago
      > "take pictures of customers" policy. Even gym memberships require this in some places. Soon one would need to provide facial 3D scan just to buy groceries.
  - superuser2 11y ago
    A photo ID is legally required (via form I-9) to work.
barrkel 11y ago
"Provide images to the public" isn't what people do; they provide images to a limited audience, either unwillingly (you can't walk around outside without creating some kind of image, it is not a willed action) or with people they know or expect to know them (online). It's technology which has converted this limited audience to a universal concept of "public".
- Karlozkiller 11y ago
  In many cases it is a willed action though. The images in this article are quite probably uploaded by the people themselves. I don't know exactly how privacy settings work on VKontakte, but from what I've seen most images seem publically searchable. Now tell me how uploading things to such a database is not a willed action. I agree with you that there is the possibility of someone else taking such images of you and everyone around you, through surveillance cameras or whatever, but for something of the scale shown in this article you'd still need quite an effort to create such a database without the help from the people themselves, especially if you want to link it to other personal information.
  - barrkel 11y ago
    People don't "upload things to a database", though, that's the point. They don't go to their photo app and think, "self, I'm going to upload this image to a global searchable database now". Rather, they think: "Steve and Mary would have liked this restaurant dish", or "I'm going to try and make my friends jealous of the great holiday I'm having". Because people don't own their own clouds, or have privatized social networks, they are forced to upload things into databases that others control. Who controls the privacy defaults typically have the most control over where the data flows thereafter. And it's all out of the user's hands; they weren't given a choice, not a real one, because the incentives for the system lead you to accept the lack of control, or spend your life neurotically trying to keep a lid on everything, or live as a technological recluse. There's no other way to live today.
- imron 11y ago
  > "Provide images to the public" isn't what people do; It isn't what they think they do, but it very much is what they do.

noja 11y ago

They're not surprised by that. They are surprised when one of the rules that has held true for the eternity of cities: that you can be semi-anonymous in a crowd, is no longer true.

Karlozkiller 11y ago
In my opinion you still can. What makes this possible? You need a database linking images to names, as well as the face-recognition data. People are freely giving away the images for the database linking it all to further personal data. If they did not do this, creating such a database would still be a massive surveillance effort, albeit probably still possible if someone really wanted to do it and had the sufficient resources. I say it's still possible to stay anonymous if you want to.
- WireWrap 11y ago
  Various businesses have a "take pictures of customers" policy. Medical offices are one example, due to insurance fraud they say. They typically don't ask. They simply tell the customer that they are about to take a picture and it is over before they know it. When I spot such a camera I stand to the side so they have to ask me to move in front of the camera. Which is when I politely refuse to participate. They don't like that very much. Last time, the person made a "well you might not be able to refuse next time" remark. He may be correct, or not, we'll see. These are cases where the images should never be uploaded to a public database or shared with any other parties. However, given the increasing use of SaaS and cloud providers, exposure to some third-parties is highly likely. Any consumer information hitting the cloud is at high risk of abuse. In addition to those scenarios you have cameras behind ATMs, cameras embedded within grocery store self-checkout lines, etc and so forth. It has already become difficult to control your image and, in some cases, prevent that image from being combined with other personally identifiable information.
  - type0 11y ago
    > "take pictures of customers" policy. Even gym memberships require this in some places. Soon one would need to provide facial 3D scan just to buy groceries.
- superuser2 11y ago
  A photo ID is legally required (via form I-9) to work.

barrkel 11y ago

"Provide images to the public" isn't what people do; they provide images to a limited audience, either unwillingly (you can't walk around outside without creating some kind of image, it is not a willed action) or with people they know or expect to know them (online). It's technology which has converted this limited audience to a universal concept of "public".

Karlozkiller 11y ago
In many cases it is a willed action though. The images in this article are quite probably uploaded by the people themselves. I don't know exactly how privacy settings work on VKontakte, but from what I've seen most images seem publically searchable. Now tell me how uploading things to such a database is not a willed action. I agree with you that there is the possibility of someone else taking such images of you and everyone around you, through surveillance cameras or whatever, but for something of the scale shown in this article you'd still need quite an effort to create such a database without the help from the people themselves, especially if you want to link it to other personal information.
- barrkel 11y ago
  People don't "upload things to a database", though, that's the point. They don't go to their photo app and think, "self, I'm going to upload this image to a global searchable database now". Rather, they think: "Steve and Mary would have liked this restaurant dish", or "I'm going to try and make my friends jealous of the great holiday I'm having". Because people don't own their own clouds, or have privatized social networks, they are forced to upload things into databases that others control. Who controls the privacy defaults typically have the most control over where the data flows thereafter. And it's all out of the user's hands; they weren't given a choice, not a real one, because the incentives for the system lead you to accept the lack of control, or spend your life neurotically trying to keep a lid on everything, or live as a technological recluse. There's no other way to live today.
imron 11y ago
> "Provide images to the public" isn't what people do; It isn't what they think they do, but it very much is what they do.