6 ms·

Are we looking at the same photos? They look uncannily alike to me, to the point where I'm left wondering if the forged license actually reuses a photo from Par

by gwern 6y ago

Are we looking at the same photos? They look uncannily alike to me, to the point where I'm left wondering if the forged license actually reuses a photo from Parks. (As a double convict in NJ, I suspect his earlier mugshots would not be hard for the forger to get. Certainly no harder than forging a license.)

crooked-v 6y ago
"Uncannily"? I don't see it. Different mouth proportions compared to the nose, different cheekbones, different eyebrow lengths...
sebastien_b 6y ago
They do look similar (enough to become a potential suspect, though I don't think should be enough for a warrant), and given that police departments don't "protect" their mugshots, I wouldn't be surprised if the picture was indeed reused (or photoshopped). But I really wonder if the same officers that dealt with the suspect also questioned the innocent victim in this case - it seems like this wouldn't be the case (and gross negligence on their part) - those people should've been able to tell them apart (instead of solely relying on the picture they got from the license). I think this is what the judge wanted instead of just the facial recognition "evidence" (which eventually led to the charges being dropped) - something like, oh I don't know, the fingerprints from the abandoned vehicle? Basic investigative work, perhaps?
- pmiller2 6y ago
  Eh, I wouldn't even say that. I'd say they look similar enough to be put into the same photo lineup, but I wouldn't even drag the guy from the article in to do a physical lineup, much less arrest him.
  - sebastien_b 6y ago
    Agree that a photo alone shouldn’t be enough for an arrest warrant. Like I said - either the officers that dealt with the suspect didn’t deal with/look at the victim, or else they’re blind (or trying to meet a quota).
    - pmiller2 6y ago
      I would hope it's unlikely these officers would suffer from a similar bias, but "they all look alike" is true in the limited sense that people who don't have much experience with particular ethnic groups do find individuals in those groups harder to distinguish than groups they do have experience with: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/life-in-the-intersection/201708/they-all-look-alike https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/life-in-the-intersec...
onion2k 6y ago
Simply put, having a suspect who looks like someone who committed a crime should never be enough to make an arrest. People look like other people. There has to be more to suspect someone than just what their face looks like. If the police make an arrest based on facial recognition alone they have essentially given up doing police work and are just following suggestions that a computer makes. If that's what society chooses to use for justice then fire all the police officers and employ some minimum wage workers to do the job instead.
- pmiller2 6y ago
  Indeed, let me present the case of William West and William West: http://dh.dickinson.edu/digitalmuseum/exhibit-artifact/babes-in-the-woods/fingerprints http://dh.dickinson.edu/digitalmuseum/exhibit-artifact/babes... Those two men truly do look a lot alike, unlike the two men referenced in the article. Even so, there's no way looking like someone should imply anything at all. After all, I bear somewhat of a resemblance to a "moderately well known, but only a real fan would recognize him on the street"-level actor, and I'd really hate to get picked up if he decided to go off and do some cocaine or something.
michael1999 6y ago
The cheekbones are different. The lips are different. It's a crappy photo, but take a look.
katbyte 6y ago
it would help if the article put them next to each other. Then yea i think it's definitely apparent they are different people: https://imgur.com/a/zJJNSFG https://imgur.com/a/zJJNSFG I would hope police are better at this sort of thing then me. Also i would hope better quality images would be used, these are terrible quality.
- PunchTornado 6y ago
  if you look at the facial structure, they're completely different people. I don't understand how somebody would mix them up...
  - pmiller2 6y ago
    Yeah. For one thing, the actual suspect's face is much wider than the man who was falsely accused. And that's just at a glance. I'm sure there are multiple other points of difference.
  - kodah 6y ago
    Nearly every feature of the face is different. Is there someone who works in AI imaging that can answer: 1. How this could happen 2. Why it's gone unsolved 3. Why this kind of tech is even attractive?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
vmception 6y ago
Would you like training on this matter? I've learned that each phenotype has to be weighed differently than the people you grew up around the most. Completely different phenotypes and patterns often times.
_underfl0w_ 6y ago
> They look uncannily alike to me uncannily ? The images aren't exactly high-res, but that's definitely two different guys. The first two photos (color one at the top and b/w mugshot pair) are the same guy, but it should hopefully be obvious that the guy in the drivers license photo is someone else. Especially to the police, since we're comparing low-res scans while the feds may have had a larger copy potentially in-hand when looking at the guy they arrested. You may just be looking at the wrong photos from the article - in which case yes, that guy looks uncannily like himself! The subtleties of the human face that change from person to person are things like cheekbone position, jawline, head shape, eye shape/size/placement, etc. They're what enable someone to "recognize" you in a human-to-human context, sometimes even with a facemask on. They're part of how you distinguish yourself in the mirror from other humans also. However, if a significant portion of one race is indistinguishable for a given observer, they haven't done enough observation. Certainly not enough to arrest someone based on their "observations". A relative inability to identify facial subtleties in member of other races is a known phenomenon and has been studied - incidentally making it the perfect candidate for law enforcement training. Seems that wasn't the case here in TFA, unfortunately. For reference, I am a different race from these guys, and my SO is a different one still, but I don't think it takes a particularly keen observer to distinguish between the two mens' faces.
- daniel957 6y ago
  Correct. It’s quite clear these are different guys even with the low-res images. So maybe OP was comparing the wrong photos.
tyingq 6y ago
There are some similarities, but if you put them side by side, you'll note many differences. https://imgur.com/a/L9GDD0m https://imgur.com/a/L9GDD0m
JshWright 6y ago
I mean... They're both black guys with facial hair and short haircuts. Beyond that, not really... Face shape is completely different, eyes and nose are very obviously different. I don't see how the two could be confused.
- zo1 6y ago
  Yeah but all of us in this thread already know that they're different people, so we're primed to come to that conclusion. However with no prior info, short glances and casual checks, they absolutely can be considered to "look the same". Anywho this is a prime example of why you need humans that aren't involved in a situation to be in the loop to augment the facial-recognition algorithms. Enable them to view clean, high-res, zoom-able versions of the source images and then have them make the final call. Heck, if you're worried about bias, assign the task to a panel of people from various ethnicities, or maybe just to people of the same ethnicity as the involved person.
  - JshWright 6y ago
    I disagree with your premise that they "look the same" even at a casual check, but even if we assume that's true, we're talking about 10 days here. I think the "casual check" excuse expires around the 10 minute mark.
    - zo1 6y ago
      Agreed - I think their plausible excuse expires after they get look of the person and I guess whatever "documents" or images they were checking them against the facial-recognition matched them. Btw, I'm not saying they look the same. I'm saying at a casual glance or quick look, or grainy-surveillance footage level, they do look strikingly similar. Another factor though we may not be considering in general regarding facial-recognition is identity theft. I've dealt with that sort of thing before, and if you're not careful the government might get really confused as to who the "actual" person is, and who was the one that stole the identity is. Again, not the case here, but it is something that police need to consider.
daniel957 6y ago
Yeah, even with the low res images it’s clear these guys aren’t the same. They’re not even the same complexion with the guy in the license photo being several shades darker. (The darkness isn’t due to the low quality of the image.) Are you sure you’re not comparing the wrong photos? I’m confident if you saw these two men stand side-by-side, you would not say that they look uncannily alike, unless you’re visually impaired. I agree with someone else’s comments about the importance of observation. My brother and I worked at the same startup. I was full-time. He was an intern. After several weeks, another intern was some how confused and thought my brother and I were the exact same person. I mean sure, siblings do look alike. But some how she didn’t notice that one of us has light brown skin and the other has dark brown skin, one of us is a whole 3 inches shorter, one of us is a whole 40 pounds heavier, one of us wore glasses and the other didn’t, one of us has a full head of hair while the other one is balding in several spots with a receding hairline, etc you already see where I’m going with this. Yet for 3 whole weeks, she came to work M-F and thought we were the same person? It was an open office environment and we all sat in one large room. <INSERT REASONABLE STATEMENT ABOUT TIMNIT GEBRU AND THE IMPORTANCE OF ETHICAL AI BUT GET DOWNVOTED TO OBLIVION>
- daniel957 6y ago
  Yay, 2 downvotes from racist and sexist trash so far! Let’s keep it coming!
  - dang 6y ago
    Hey, I understand how activating internet threads can be, and I get from your comment upthread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25564255 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25564255) that you have a personal connection to this topic which most commenters don't. I respect that a lot, and the fact that you were willing to share some of your experience in your GP comment was a really positive contribution. I know that's not easy, and you're under no obligation to do it, but FWIW, we badly need more of that. Please don't post like this comment here, though. It only hurts and makes things even worse. The thing that helps is to share some of what you know and some of your experience, so others can learn. A small minority of commenters is going to react badly, repeat stock objections, downvote etc., and respond with flamebait. But most of those comments will eventually get downvoted, flagged, and/or moderated. That's the best we can hope for on a public forum where anyone can easily create an account. More importantly, the rest of us are genuinely interested. If you would please follow the site guidelines by ignoring the flamebait (other than to flag or downvote it, and email us at hn@ycombinator.com in egregious cases), and by sharing information with curious readers when you're so inclined, we'd be grateful. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

by gwern 6y ago

crooked-v 6y ago

"Uncannily"? I don't see it. Different mouth proportions compared to the nose, different cheekbones, different eyebrow lengths...

sebastien_b 6y ago

They do look similar (enough to become a potential suspect, though I don't think should be enough for a warrant), and given that police departments don't "protect" their mugshots, I wouldn't be surprised if the picture was indeed reused (or photoshopped). But I really wonder if the same officers that dealt with the suspect also questioned the innocent victim in this case - it seems like this wouldn't be the case (and gross negligence on their part) - those people should've been able to tell them apart (instead of solely relying on the picture they got from the license). I think this is what the judge wanted instead of just the facial recognition "evidence" (which eventually led to the charges being dropped) - something like, oh I don't know, the fingerprints from the abandoned vehicle? Basic investigative work, perhaps?

pmiller2 6y ago
Eh, I wouldn't even say that. I'd say they look similar enough to be put into the same photo lineup, but I wouldn't even drag the guy from the article in to do a physical lineup, much less arrest him.
- sebastien_b 6y ago
  Agree that a photo alone shouldn’t be enough for an arrest warrant. Like I said - either the officers that dealt with the suspect didn’t deal with/look at the victim, or else they’re blind (or trying to meet a quota).
  - pmiller2 6y ago
    I would hope it's unlikely these officers would suffer from a similar bias, but "they all look alike" is true in the limited sense that people who don't have much experience with particular ethnic groups do find individuals in those groups harder to distinguish than groups they do have experience with: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/life-in-the-intersection/201708/they-all-look-alike https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/life-in-the-intersec...

onion2k 6y ago

Simply put, having a suspect who looks like someone who committed a crime should never be enough to make an arrest. People look like other people. There has to be more to suspect someone than just what their face looks like. If the police make an arrest based on facial recognition alone they have essentially given up doing police work and are just following suggestions that a computer makes. If that's what society chooses to use for justice then fire all the police officers and employ some minimum wage workers to do the job instead.

pmiller2 6y ago
Indeed, let me present the case of William West and William West: http://dh.dickinson.edu/digitalmuseum/exhibit-artifact/babes-in-the-woods/fingerprints http://dh.dickinson.edu/digitalmuseum/exhibit-artifact/babes... Those two men truly do look a lot alike, unlike the two men referenced in the article. Even so, there's no way looking like someone should imply anything at all. After all, I bear somewhat of a resemblance to a "moderately well known, but only a real fan would recognize him on the street"-level actor, and I'd really hate to get picked up if he decided to go off and do some cocaine or something.

michael1999 6y ago

The cheekbones are different. The lips are different. It's a crappy photo, but take a look.

katbyte 6y ago

it would help if the article put them next to each other. Then yea i think it's definitely apparent they are different people: https://imgur.com/a/zJJNSFG https://imgur.com/a/zJJNSFG I would hope police are better at this sort of thing then me. Also i would hope better quality images would be used, these are terrible quality.

PunchTornado 6y ago
if you look at the facial structure, they're completely different people. I don't understand how somebody would mix them up...
- pmiller2 6y ago
  Yeah. For one thing, the actual suspect's face is much wider than the man who was falsely accused. And that's just at a glance. I'm sure there are multiple other points of difference.
- kodah 6y ago
  Nearly every feature of the face is different. Is there someone who works in AI imaging that can answer: 1. How this could happen 2. Why it's gone unsolved 3. Why this kind of tech is even attractive?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

vmception 6y ago

Would you like training on this matter? I've learned that each phenotype has to be weighed differently than the people you grew up around the most. Completely different phenotypes and patterns often times.

_underfl0w_ 6y ago

> They look uncannily alike to me uncannily ? The images aren't exactly high-res, but that's definitely two different guys. The first two photos (color one at the top and b/w mugshot pair) are the same guy, but it should hopefully be obvious that the guy in the drivers license photo is someone else. Especially to the police, since we're comparing low-res scans while the feds may have had a larger copy potentially in-hand when looking at the guy they arrested. You may just be looking at the wrong photos from the article - in which case yes, that guy looks uncannily like himself! The subtleties of the human face that change from person to person are things like cheekbone position, jawline, head shape, eye shape/size/placement, etc. They're what enable someone to "recognize" you in a human-to-human context, sometimes even with a facemask on. They're part of how you distinguish yourself in the mirror from other humans also. However, if a significant portion of one race is indistinguishable for a given observer, they haven't done enough observation. Certainly not enough to arrest someone based on their "observations". A relative inability to identify facial subtleties in member of other races is a known phenomenon and has been studied - incidentally making it the perfect candidate for law enforcement training. Seems that wasn't the case here in TFA, unfortunately. For reference, I am a different race from these guys, and my SO is a different one still, but I don't think it takes a particularly keen observer to distinguish between the two mens' faces.

daniel957 6y ago
Correct. It’s quite clear these are different guys even with the low-res images. So maybe OP was comparing the wrong photos.

tyingq 6y ago

There are some similarities, but if you put them side by side, you'll note many differences. https://imgur.com/a/L9GDD0m https://imgur.com/a/L9GDD0m

JshWright 6y ago

I mean... They're both black guys with facial hair and short haircuts. Beyond that, not really... Face shape is completely different, eyes and nose are very obviously different. I don't see how the two could be confused.

zo1 6y ago
Yeah but all of us in this thread already know that they're different people, so we're primed to come to that conclusion. However with no prior info, short glances and casual checks, they absolutely can be considered to "look the same". Anywho this is a prime example of why you need humans that aren't involved in a situation to be in the loop to augment the facial-recognition algorithms. Enable them to view clean, high-res, zoom-able versions of the source images and then have them make the final call. Heck, if you're worried about bias, assign the task to a panel of people from various ethnicities, or maybe just to people of the same ethnicity as the involved person.
- JshWright 6y ago
  I disagree with your premise that they "look the same" even at a casual check, but even if we assume that's true, we're talking about 10 days here. I think the "casual check" excuse expires around the 10 minute mark.
  - zo1 6y ago
    Agreed - I think their plausible excuse expires after they get look of the person and I guess whatever "documents" or images they were checking them against the facial-recognition matched them. Btw, I'm not saying they look the same. I'm saying at a casual glance or quick look, or grainy-surveillance footage level, they do look strikingly similar. Another factor though we may not be considering in general regarding facial-recognition is identity theft. I've dealt with that sort of thing before, and if you're not careful the government might get really confused as to who the "actual" person is, and who was the one that stole the identity is. Again, not the case here, but it is something that police need to consider.

daniel957 6y ago

Yeah, even with the low res images it’s clear these guys aren’t the same. They’re not even the same complexion with the guy in the license photo being several shades darker. (The darkness isn’t due to the low quality of the image.) Are you sure you’re not comparing the wrong photos? I’m confident if you saw these two men stand side-by-side, you would not say that they look uncannily alike, unless you’re visually impaired. I agree with someone else’s comments about the importance of observation. My brother and I worked at the same startup. I was full-time. He was an intern. After several weeks, another intern was some how confused and thought my brother and I were the exact same person. I mean sure, siblings do look alike. But some how she didn’t notice that one of us has light brown skin and the other has dark brown skin, one of us is a whole 3 inches shorter, one of us is a whole 40 pounds heavier, one of us wore glasses and the other didn’t, one of us has a full head of hair while the other one is balding in several spots with a receding hairline, etc you already see where I’m going with this. Yet for 3 whole weeks, she came to work M-F and thought we were the same person? It was an open office environment and we all sat in one large room. <INSERT REASONABLE STATEMENT ABOUT TIMNIT GEBRU AND THE IMPORTANCE OF ETHICAL AI BUT GET DOWNVOTED TO OBLIVION>

daniel957 6y ago
Yay, 2 downvotes from racist and sexist trash so far! Let’s keep it coming!
- dang 6y ago
  Hey, I understand how activating internet threads can be, and I get from your comment upthread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25564255 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25564255) that you have a personal connection to this topic which most commenters don't. I respect that a lot, and the fact that you were willing to share some of your experience in your GP comment was a really positive contribution. I know that's not easy, and you're under no obligation to do it, but FWIW, we badly need more of that. Please don't post like this comment here, though. It only hurts and makes things even worse. The thing that helps is to share some of what you know and some of your experience, so others can learn. A small minority of commenters is going to react badly, repeat stock objections, downvote etc., and respond with flamebait. But most of those comments will eventually get downvoted, flagged, and/or moderated. That's the best we can hope for on a public forum where anyone can easily create an account. More importantly, the rest of us are genuinely interested. If you would please follow the site guidelines by ignoring the flamebait (other than to flag or downvote it, and email us at hn@ycombinator.com in egregious cases), and by sharing information with curious readers when you're so inclined, we'd be grateful. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html