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AI The Military Privacy United States Technology

The Military Is Building Long-Range Facial Recognition That Works In the Dark (medium.com) 21

According to contracts posted on a federal spending database, the U.S. military is working to develop facial recognition technology that reads the pattern of heat being emitted by faces in order to identify specific people. OneZero reports: Now, the military wants to develop a facial recognition system that analyzes infrared images to identify individuals. The Army Research Lab has previously publicized research in this area, but these contracts, which started at the end of September 2019 and run until 2021, indicate the technology is now being actively developed for use in the field. "Sensors should be demonstrable in environments such as targets seen through automotive windshield glass, targets that are backlit, and targets that are obscured due to light weather (e.g., fog)," the Department of Defense indicated when requesting proposals.

The DoD is calling for the technology to be incorporated into a device that is small enough to be carried by an individual. The device should be able to operate from a distance of 10 to 500 meters and match individuals against a watchlist. According to the details of the request, the Defense Forensics and Biometrics Agency is directly overseeing work on the technology. Two companies are working on this technology on behalf of the DFBA, Cyan Systems, Inc. and Polaris Sensor Technologies.

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The Military Is Building Long-Range Facial Recognition That Works In the Dark

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  • Face heat/blood distributions change with exercise. Just how accurate do this system going to be?

    • As accurate as drone missiles picking out terrorists in the middle of an Afghani wedding party.
    • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      In any war zone? The DNA test after the drone use will find out for sure...
      • by Lennie ( 16154 )

        Warzones are one thing, but most drone strikes aren't even in warzones and lot are even in countries the US doesn't even have a conflict with.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Glass will also block IR. This very old technology that they are trying to present as new to justify the waste of money can easily be defeated with a common pair of glasses.

  • Dupe alert (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Matt_H ( 34421 ) on Thursday January 16, 2020 @02:11AM (#59625410) Homepage

    Now that sounds familiar [slashdot.org]

  • It can't even recognize that its own story has been published here before, days ago.

  • News: hi-tech infrared images let military recognise and target individuals.

    In other news, researches found that among certain groups, having a burning cigarette hanging from lips greatly increases life expectancy.

  • Facial recognition with infrared cameras already works fairly reliably for the cases of night-time detection. It's also used today in automotive/transport applications for driver monitoring (e.g. drowsiness detection) for both night-time scenarios and when the driver is wearing sunglasses. Granted, this is all at close range - perhaps the heat aspect being pursued here is novel for detection at a distance?

  • The tin foil face mask.

    I can imagine hordes of mannequins deployed in valleys in some Stan country, with heating elements built into the faces.

  • Are soldiers having trouble working out who the enemy is? Will this make them less likely to blow up civilians with drones, if terrorists are standing nearby?

    • Yes and no, respectively.

      But this will enable sentry guns and cheaper drones to autonomously attack targets on a selective basis. A tomahawk missile has long been able to fly through a meter square window if you provide GPS coordinates of the building and a picture of the window. This will enable a much smaller munition to deliver a much smaller payload directly to a specific human target if you provide rough GPS coordinates and a photo. And it will never, ever be misused! Ever!

  • Remember, if it was in a Resistance film about WW II, all the old methods still work.

    So wear your Seahawks face paint, your Anon masks, they're all good.

    Bedazzle them and vary the reflective paint and it's thickness, use stripes and fake faces.

    All of it is good, and it all defeats the AI.

    And if none of that works, just use some dark paint - I recommend the green/brown cam stick

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