4 ms·
The next fight over the use of facial recognition could be in the supermarkets
- NoSalt 8mo agohttps://archive.ph/5OXNR https://archive.ph/5OXNR
- rapnie 8mo ago> While stores often implement the technology to help curtail shoplifting, lawmakers and advocates are worried that it will be repurposed for profiling customers and adjusting prices based on information gathered. Worried? With the web of 3rd party services that are somehow involved in the delivery of any cloud service, with all their different privacy policies that apply with carefully crafted legalese, hosted in different jurisdictions. Combined with that juicy data, the New Oil that fuels surveillance capitalism. Unless somehow watertight guarantees are provided, it is more realistic to assume widespread abuse is commonplace, and work from there.
- stuaxo 8mo agoIs it to curtail shoplifting or is the main benefit selling the data ? If they wanted to curtail shoplifting they could employ more staff.
- IncreasePosts 8mo agoAI seems to scale better considering most shoplifting is done by repeat offenders, and AI can do things easily like share knowledge with other stores in the area about who is a shoplifter. Also, it isn't even clear to me how more staff prevents shoplifting. Just have more people stare at cameras? Follow suspicious customers around?
- deleted 8mo ago[deleted]
- bloomingeek 8mo agoWe were in our local Target store yesterday. My wife purchased some OTC cough syrup, the self check out register wanted an employee for confirmation she was the proper age. (We're in our sixty's.) Instead of just looking at her driver's license, he used his handheld device to scan the license! I would never allow this, myself.
- john_strinlai 8mo ago>Instead of just looking at her driver's license, he used his handheld device to scan the license! depending on what is in the cough syrup, they arent using the scanner to verify age. they are tracking who makes the purchase, so if a bunch of meth or whatever gets cooked up, they have a list of suspects.
- TYPE_FASTER 8mo agoYes. Federal law requires retailers of drugs containing pseudoephedrine, ephedrine, and phenlypropanolamine to record the buyer's name and address and keep the records for two years (https://www.fda.gov/drugs/information-drug-class/legal-requirements-sale-and-purchase-drug-products-containing-pseudoephedrine-ephedrine-and https://www.fda.gov/drugs/information-drug-class/legal-requi...). While there is no federal law restricting the sale of medications containing Dextromethorphan, a common cough suppressant, US states have started regulating sales of these medications (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dextromethorphan_regulation_by_U.S._jurisdiction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dextromethorphan_regulation_by...). It looks like most of the time, it's an 18yrs and up age restriction. My guess would be that it's easier for company policy to always scan the ID, even for age verification, instead of having different policies depending on what is being purchased.
- jtokoph 8mo agoIn California, the pharmacy computer queries some state database to log the purchase and get approval. If you buy too much too quickly your purchase will be blocked. My closest pharmacy “loses its connection to the system” frequently which results in them being unable to sell me the medicine. The computer will refuse to ring it up.
- gib444 8mo agoShops are making extremely feeble efforts to curtail theft such that I think it's a nice cover for raising prices, slashing costs and increasing data capitalism etc For example at a local Asda, an expensive donut brand are placed right by the entrance. I see people stealing them all the time. At Gregg's bakery, many popular items are left on a table half way to the door, almost inviting theft. Other expensive items are put in the chiller/hot cabinet open to all. It's been so obvious what changes need to be made, you ask yourself why they have not
- SoftTalker 8mo agoSales from impulse buys of expensive high-margin items are enough to offset the losses from theft.
- hermanzegerman 8mo agoIf you have decent social nets you don't need to worry about theft of basic items. If people stealing food is such a big problem, your country is fucked up in a bad way. Here they don't even watch the self checkout, and don't use those annoying checkouts with a scale.
- Heer_J 8mo ago[dead]
- morninglight 8mo agoIn order to read their tale about surveillance, Politico tells you to "SIGN IN". They want you to give them your email, employer's name and your job title. Is this some kind of joke? Or are these people actually that stupid?
- chrisjj 8mo ago> Or are these people actually that stupid? Or simply they judge enough of their readers to be that stupid.
- wolandomny 8mo agoWe already lost at the airports. Not shocking :(
- briankshoe16 8mo ago[dead]
- kittikitti 8mo agoI have a friend whose nearest grocery store is surrounded by Flock "safety" cameras. The police and security in the retail or grocery stores regularly share data and logins, and this extends across multiple states. He says it's been brought up in mundane traffic court and affected his ability to enroll his children into schools. Not only that, but his ability to seek legal guidance is hindered since the state can easily produce suspicious evidence on a whim against him. It seems like anyone with even a cursory role can access this information and abuse it. It's ridiculous that this is happening. I think a sizable number of people on Hacker News actually support these systems and if you're one of them, please keep yourself safe.
- cj 8mo agoFlock cameras prevent someone from enrolling a child in school? I'd be curious to hear how those dots connect.
- mixmastamyk 8mo agoLast week’s episode of enshittening dystopia: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47351239 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47351239
- morkalork 8mo agoYou'll have to elaborate more on some of the details
- remarkEon 8mo agoAt some point we have to realize that all of these super intrusive tech implementations are downstream from devolving into a low trust society. The reason we have to do this in the first place is because we are electing to not put the people who abuse these goods in prison. That’s a choice we are making. The trade off is additional overhead and risk on police and prosecutorial misconduct vs vast state and corporate surveillance apparatus. Pick your poison but choose wisely.
- neuralRiot 8mo agoI don’t know how that would work. Some states mandate that if the displayed price is different, the customer should be charged the lower price.
- The_President 8mo agoMaybe they can facial recognize my disgust with their musak selection and vax commercials playing at 150% volume.