Zimbabwe is Introducing a Mass Facial Recognition Project With Chinese AI Firm CloudWalk (qz.com) 33
An anonymous reader shares a report: In March, the Zimbabwean government signed a strategic partnership with the Gunagzhou-based startup CloudWalk Technology to begin a large-scale facial recognition program throughout the country. The agreement, backed by the Chinese government's Belt and Road initiative, will see the technology primarily used in security and law enforcement and will likely be expanded to other public programs.
[...] Zimbabwe may be giving away valuable data as Chinese AI technologists stand to benefit from access to a database of millions of Zimbabwean faces Harare will share with CloudWalk. [...] CloudWalk has already recalibrated its existing technology through three-dimensional light technology in order to recognize darker skin tones. In order to recognize other characteristics that may differ from China's population, CloudWalk is also developing a system that recognizes different hairstyles and body shapes, another representative explained to the Global Times.
[...] Zimbabwe may be giving away valuable data as Chinese AI technologists stand to benefit from access to a database of millions of Zimbabwean faces Harare will share with CloudWalk. [...] CloudWalk has already recalibrated its existing technology through three-dimensional light technology in order to recognize darker skin tones. In order to recognize other characteristics that may differ from China's population, CloudWalk is also developing a system that recognizes different hairstyles and body shapes, another representative explained to the Global Times.
Make it easier to identify the white people (Score:2)
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Didn't they pretty much finish routing all the white farmers? I know their farming output has gone down the drain and Mugabe begged the UN for financial and food aid after it turned out only whites were capable of working their ass off to produce food from shitty land.
I think all aid to Africa should be stopped and let nature take its course. They'll learn only if they are allowed independence to learn even if through great costs, and independence can only be achieved by pulling the plug on all charity and
Re: Make it easier to identify the white people (Score:1)
Problem wasn't shitty land, Zimbabwe wasn't known as the Breadbasket of Africa for nothing. The problem was Mugabe drove off all the farmers and gave the land to pig ignorant cronies who had zero farming interest or experience.
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The real question is (Score:2)
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Don't know. Maybe they should ask a computer to do it.
https://www.wired.com/story/wh... [wired.com]
Most likely explanation (Score:2)
Facial recognition software [nytimes.com] is most likely to identify a person:
When the person in the photo is a white man, the software is right 99 percent of the time.
Extrapolating this level of accuracy to Asian and African citizens, since world citizens of European descent have slipped below 10% of the total, would seemingly be in the interest of the Chinese.
This ain't right ... (Score:2)
... because Zimbabwe ain't got no fucking money [tradingeconomics.com]
The GDP value of Zimbabwe represents 0.03 percent of the world economy.
.
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Meta (Score:2)
"...and other programs"
This will allow the emperor to continuously track his political opponents and automatically flesh out his opponents' networks.
It's just metadata, Geo. Washington, friend of Tom Jefferson and James Madison and Ben Franklin...no need to fear.
Our own FBI and CIA say so!
The why (Score:3)
Track who gave a speech and all the faces of people who attended the political event.
Perfect example of where it shouldn't be used. (Score:2)
Given the history of the largely Shona-run ZANU-PF political party using its position to lord it over the largest minority ethnicity (the Ndeble) including the Matabeleland massacres in the early 1980s, there is a large possibility of it being used as the Chinese use it to repress minorities in certain regions.
China has a very strong policy of embracing Africa. When I was in Zimbabwe last year I saw a brand new Chinese-built coal-coke plant, and they are making a heavy investment in rail transport in the re
Dysfunctional country with messed up priorities (Score:3)
This is a country so dysfunctional that they don't even have their own currency. They "solved" their hyperinflation by letting people use foreign currency. Managing the money supply in some way is a core function of government, and they just totally outsourced it. You'd think they'd want to fix that among other things in order to get back on track as a well-run country. Nope. Hi tech surveillance system. Yeah. That's the priority. At least they got rid of Mugabe after all this time; but I guess they've got a really big hole full of insanity to dig themselves out of. It's going to be a while.
Black people (Score:1)