5 ms·

500MP camera that can identify every face in a crowd of tens of thousands

61 points by systemfreund 7y ago

davidhyde 7y ago
> China currently has an estimated 200 million CCTV cameras watching over its citizens I wish reporters would stop mixing up cctv cameras with facial recognition cameras. 200 million cctv cameras is a meaningless number in the context of facial recognition. How many of those cameras are capable of facial recognition? No wait, that’s way to “sciencey” and detailed for this clickbait article.
- Yetanfou 7y ago
  Facial recognition is a software function which can be performed on image data coming from any camera with sufficient resolution, most likely that includes the majority of surveillance cameras deployed in China. China might suffer under an antiquated and corrupt political system but the country does not lack modern technology.
  - myself248 7y ago
    Furthermore, facial recognition is constantly improving, and a camera that might've been inadequate for it a few years ago can now be used for matching, if not training. Combine that with the replacement rate of cameras, and you get two factors crossing each other and meaning that the vast majority of those 200M cameras can already be used for recognition, and the ones that can't today, will be soon.
    - davidhyde 7y ago
      My point was not about what China is doing and what they are capable of. My point is that the reporting is shoddy. You simply cannot recognise someone’s face in a large crowd with a traditional wide angle 320x240 resolution cctv camera mounted high up on a pole. This is not the movies where you can “zoom in and clarify”. Traditional cctv can place people at a certain time based on the colour of their clothes, their height etc. It is used for gathering evidence after a crime has been committed, not for automatically recognising people. Modern cctv has high enough resolution for facial recognition but nobody bothers reporting numbers properly. It’s the differentiation between the capabilities that I want to point out. It’s like saying that there are 1 bn toy guns AND real guns in existence. It’s a meaningless number.
      - fireattack 7y ago
        Of course I don't have a number or source either, but it's not really that common to have such low resolution camera even for surveillance any more. At least not in China.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- Mirioron 7y ago
  China has a very large number of cameras on their roads that essentially constantly surveil all of the drivers on the main roads. I imagine that a sizable chunk of those quoted CCTV cameras are those.
TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago
This looks to be either 36 or 40, can't quite count the discrete units correctly from the photo. Let's say it's 40 x ~14MP cameras fixed in to a housing. What's stopping anyone from using higher resolution subunits and more of them. Or, if you bolt ten of these things together do you get a 5000MP camera?
- scoopertrooper 7y ago
  I guess the headline here isn't that these plucky scientists managed to stick a bunch of cameras together, but rather the Chinese state can stick one of these in a crowded area and instantly identify everybody within it.
  - PhantomGremlin 7y ago
    these plucky scientists I assume you used that word sarcastically? From Wiktionary: plucky (comparative pluckier, superlative pluckiest) Having or showing pluck, courage or spirit in trying circumstances. Synonyms brave spunky feisty I dunno. IMO a "plucky" Chinese scientist would be one who would refuse to work on something as dystopian as this.
    - jvagner 7y ago
      I think that was sarcasm...
- mekkkkkk 7y ago
  Yeah, I guess achieving arbitrarily huge images is just a matter of increasing the resolution/number of sensors and then applying the correct optics. The bottleneck (and technical achievement) of a system like this would be the processing power required for stitching and analyzing these massive images in anything close to real time.
  - londons_explore 7y ago
    The processing can be parallelized too. Just split the data into chunks and hand it out to GPU's. I don't forsee any scaling limits really, apart from $$$'s and power availability
bArray 7y ago
This sounds like hell, especially coupled with China trying to "predict crime" before it happens [1] and a "social credit" score based in part on who you are seen with [2]. It's only a matter of time before this technology is implemented in your Country [3]. [1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-ai-crimes-before-happen-artificial-intelligence-security-plans-beijing-meng-jianzhu-a7962496.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-ai-crime... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186 [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/technology/ecuador-surveillance-cameras-police-government.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/technology/ecuador-survei...
bkmeneguello 7y ago
I really don't understand why to concern. We keep putting more power in government's hands in name of "peace" or "security". This is just one step further.

61 points by systemfreund 7y ago

> China currently has an estimated 200 million CCTV cameras watching over its citizens I wish reporters would stop mixing up cctv cameras with facial recognition cameras. 200 million cctv cameras is a meaningless number in the context of facial recognition. How many of those cameras are capable of facial recognition? No wait, that’s way to “sciencey” and detailed for this clickbait article.

Yetanfou 7y ago
Facial recognition is a software function which can be performed on image data coming from any camera with sufficient resolution, most likely that includes the majority of surveillance cameras deployed in China. China might suffer under an antiquated and corrupt political system but the country does not lack modern technology.
- myself248 7y ago
  Furthermore, facial recognition is constantly improving, and a camera that might've been inadequate for it a few years ago can now be used for matching, if not training. Combine that with the replacement rate of cameras, and you get two factors crossing each other and meaning that the vast majority of those 200M cameras can already be used for recognition, and the ones that can't today, will be soon.
  - davidhyde 7y ago
    My point was not about what China is doing and what they are capable of. My point is that the reporting is shoddy. You simply cannot recognise someone’s face in a large crowd with a traditional wide angle 320x240 resolution cctv camera mounted high up on a pole. This is not the movies where you can “zoom in and clarify”. Traditional cctv can place people at a certain time based on the colour of their clothes, their height etc. It is used for gathering evidence after a crime has been committed, not for automatically recognising people. Modern cctv has high enough resolution for facial recognition but nobody bothers reporting numbers properly. It’s the differentiation between the capabilities that I want to point out. It’s like saying that there are 1 bn toy guns AND real guns in existence. It’s a meaningless number.
    - fireattack 7y ago
      Of course I don't have a number or source either, but it's not really that common to have such low resolution camera even for surveillance any more. At least not in China.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
Mirioron 7y ago
China has a very large number of cameras on their roads that essentially constantly surveil all of the drivers on the main roads. I imagine that a sizable chunk of those quoted CCTV cameras are those.

TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago

This looks to be either 36 or 40, can't quite count the discrete units correctly from the photo. Let's say it's 40 x ~14MP cameras fixed in to a housing. What's stopping anyone from using higher resolution subunits and more of them. Or, if you bolt ten of these things together do you get a 5000MP camera?

scoopertrooper 7y ago
I guess the headline here isn't that these plucky scientists managed to stick a bunch of cameras together, but rather the Chinese state can stick one of these in a crowded area and instantly identify everybody within it.
- PhantomGremlin 7y ago
  these plucky scientists I assume you used that word sarcastically? From Wiktionary: plucky (comparative pluckier, superlative pluckiest) Having or showing pluck, courage or spirit in trying circumstances. Synonyms brave spunky feisty I dunno. IMO a "plucky" Chinese scientist would be one who would refuse to work on something as dystopian as this.
  - jvagner 7y ago
    I think that was sarcasm...
mekkkkkk 7y ago
Yeah, I guess achieving arbitrarily huge images is just a matter of increasing the resolution/number of sensors and then applying the correct optics. The bottleneck (and technical achievement) of a system like this would be the processing power required for stitching and analyzing these massive images in anything close to real time.
- londons_explore 7y ago
  The processing can be parallelized too. Just split the data into chunks and hand it out to GPU's. I don't forsee any scaling limits really, apart from $$$'s and power availability

bArray 7y ago

This sounds like hell, especially coupled with China trying to "predict crime" before it happens [1] and a "social credit" score based in part on who you are seen with [2]. It's only a matter of time before this technology is implemented in your Country [3]. [1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-ai-crimes-before-happen-artificial-intelligence-security-plans-beijing-meng-jianzhu-a7962496.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-ai-crime... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186 [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/technology/ecuador-surveillance-cameras-police-government.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/technology/ecuador-survei...

bkmeneguello 7y ago

I really don't understand why to concern. We keep putting more power in government's hands in name of "peace" or "security". This is just one step further.