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No more checking in: why public facial recognition may take off

Ross Dawson, July 18, 2010 4:50 PM US PT

We all know that processing power has for many years increased exponentially and continues to do so. This essentially means that any processing-intensive task you can imagine will eventually be possible.

Facial recognition happens to be a task that humans are hard-wired to be exceptionally good at. While computers struggled at this for a long time, it is now an entirely viable technology in controlled conditions, as when people are walking through turnstiles or gates.

The facial recognition used at the 2001 Super Bowl was successful enough to apparently nab 19 people with pending arrest warrants, while facial recognition is now commonly used in border security.

It becomes a lot harder when people's faces are not viewed from the front, however to a large degree that's where the increased processing power comes in handy.

Mark Cuban says that he has just invested in a company that uses video to identify how many people are in a given area, which can be useful for safety, security, and traffic control.

He says the next step is to use this technology for facial recognition. Of course there will be a massive outcry over privacy, so any such systems is likely to be opt-in (you actively choose to be identified rather than having to take action to opt-out).

However there is a very interesting precedent. After many years of trying to get location-based social networks going, over the last couple of years Foursquare and Gowalla have been growing at an extraordinary pace, and Facebook apparently due to join the fun very soon.

These systems allow people to share their location with a select group of friends. Implicitly there is confidence in the service provider to be treating this information appropriately and maintaining solid security.

Many of the power users of using location based social networks such as Foursquare are getting tired of checking in whenever they get to a new place. It is likely that a fair proportion of these people, if presented with an intelligently designed offer to securely identify their location as they go about, would accept it.

They may even be happy to occasionally accept commercial offers, leading to a scenario similar to Minority Report, where biometric analysis results in truly personalized advertising.

Of course almost everyone may shy completely away from automated tracking by facial recognition. But as we explore our relationship with technology and privacy, this is certainly one route by which people could grow to accept or even embrace facial recognition.

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4 Comments

martin king said:

Very exciting but while many look at this as a technology for freedom others will be looking at it as a technology for control - it will be interesting how all this pans out.

How do you think the control - freedom factors will pan out in the future?

July 19, 2010 2:27 AM

Simon Dufour said:

Personally, I don't understand this obsession for privacy in public places. If I'm in a public place, I can be identified at all time. People can see my face and identify me. Someone else could yell this name and it'd still be in his right. That person could tell anybody that he saw me and nothing could be done.

Why is it any different with facial recognition? The manager of a restaurant have the right to know who's entering his property. He can even throw you out if he wants. At any time he can know who's there and if the police call and ask if Mr.X is in the place. What's the problem?

Why should people care? You fear being spotted by criminals? They don't care about your name, they just want your money. However, the camera will also get his name. If he wears a mask, then the police will probably already be on its way. The people would benefit from an higher security.

Me, I just don't care. I'm not important enough for people to stalk me. It seems projects like this are only a problem to people that don't want to be seen somewhere. That's shady to me. Why would you hide in the supermarket? Why would you hide in a cinema? Oh, is it because the person will know that you're not at your house? Yeah well.. my appartment is empty 80% of the time, they actually have more chance to find it empty than anything else.

Seriously. I am getting sick of reasons to stop enforcing speed limits and security in public places. Bring this facial recognition technology. I'll be the first to accept it. Oh.. and please. Add algorithm to keep me safe, I'll really appreciate.

July 19, 2010 5:37 AM

Ross Dawson said:

Good to have some contrasting views!

I think perforce we'll all have to take Simon's view. There is a kind of pleasure to feel completely unrecognized on the street, for example when we visit new cities, but the fact is we are and always have been visible wherever we go. Step recognition technologies up a notch, and we might as well enjoy it.

I love David Brin's take on this in The Transparent Society: transparency is inevitable, but it could be either one-way - individuals are seen by institutions - or two-way - people can see back into the institutions with the same degree of transparency.

There absolutely is the risk that this (or any other) power gets abused - one of the reasons I'm cautious about governments gaining powerful (one-way) surveillance technologies is that you never know what that government's successor will be.

As always, the social response to technologies is more interesting than the technologies themselves. We will soon enough see what happens on this one.

July 19, 2010 3:57 PM

CoCreatr said:

This just in.

RT @KristinMandia Creepy.> AR + facial-recognition Minority Report Style ads in Japan http://bit.ly/biGdot Via @DebWeinstein @sidneyeve

July 21, 2010 5:14 PM

Ross Dawson is globally recognized as a leading futurist, entrepreneur, keynote speaker, strategy advisor, and bestselling author. He is Founding Chairman of four companies: professional services and venture firm Advanced Human Technologies, future and strategy consulting group Future Exploration Network, leading events firm The Insight Exchange, and influence ratings start-up Repyoot.

Ross is author most recently of Implementing Enterprise 2.0, the prescient Living Networks, which anticipated the social network revolution, and the Amazon.com bestseller Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships (click on the links for free chapter downloads). He is based in Sydney and San Francisco with his wife jewellery designer Victoria Buckley and two beautiful young daughters.