Unlike Clearview AI, this Facial-Recognition Search Engine is Open to Everyone (cnn.com) 30
This week CNN investigated PimEyes, a "mysterious" but powerful facial-recognition search engine:
If you upload a picture of your face to PimEyes' website, it will immediately show you any pictures of yourself that the company has found around the internet. You might recognize all of them, or be surprised (or, perhaps, even horrified) by some; these images may include anything from wedding or vacation snapshots to pornographic images. PimEyes is open to anyone with internet access. It's a stark contrast from Clearview AI, which became well-known for building its enormous stash of faces with images of people from social networks and limits its use to law enforcement (Clearview has said it has hundreds of such customers).
PimEyes' decision to make facial-recognition software available to the general public crosses a line that technology companies are typically unwilling to traverse, and opens up endless possibilities for how it can be used and abused. Imagine a potential employer digging into your past, an abusive ex tracking you, or a random stranger snapping a photo of you in public and then finding you online. This is all possible through PimEyes: Though the website instructs users to search for themselves, it doesn't stop them from uploading photos of anyone. At the same time, it doesn't explicitly identify anyone by name, but as CNN Business discovered by using the site, that information may be just clicks away from images PimEyes pulls up...
PimEyes lets users see a limited number of small, somewhat pixelated search results at no cost, or you can pay a monthly fee, which starts at $29.99, for more extensive search results and features (such as to click through to see full-size images on the websites where PimEyes found them and to set up alerts for when PimEyes finds new pictures of faces online that its software believes match an uploaded face)... Although PimEyes instructs visitors to only search for their own face, there's no mechanism on the site to ensure it's used this way... There's also no way to ensure this facial-recognition technology isn't used to misidentify people...
The website currently lists no information about who owns or runs the search engine, or how to reach them, and users must submit a form to get answers to questions or help with accounts.
PimEyes' decision to make facial-recognition software available to the general public crosses a line that technology companies are typically unwilling to traverse, and opens up endless possibilities for how it can be used and abused. Imagine a potential employer digging into your past, an abusive ex tracking you, or a random stranger snapping a photo of you in public and then finding you online. This is all possible through PimEyes: Though the website instructs users to search for themselves, it doesn't stop them from uploading photos of anyone. At the same time, it doesn't explicitly identify anyone by name, but as CNN Business discovered by using the site, that information may be just clicks away from images PimEyes pulls up...
PimEyes lets users see a limited number of small, somewhat pixelated search results at no cost, or you can pay a monthly fee, which starts at $29.99, for more extensive search results and features (such as to click through to see full-size images on the websites where PimEyes found them and to set up alerts for when PimEyes finds new pictures of faces online that its software believes match an uploaded face)... Although PimEyes instructs visitors to only search for their own face, there's no mechanism on the site to ensure it's used this way... There's also no way to ensure this facial-recognition technology isn't used to misidentify people...
The website currently lists no information about who owns or runs the search engine, or how to reach them, and users must submit a form to get answers to questions or help with accounts.
Did work for me (Score:3)
I just tried it.
The pictures found looked somewhat like me, but none were me.
Re: Did work for me (Score:4, Funny)
"Anymore"?
Re: Did work for me (Score:1)
ditto
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Well it did work for me - from a webcam image I just snapped.
They have an interesting model - show the image you found but then charge you for the URL and "more" similar websites.
So... (Score:3)
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Looks like you didn't read all of it, though.
> CNN Business sent a note to a generic-sounding PimEyes email address, which was listed on an old version of the website's privacy policy
>They refused to conduct a formal interview, saying they "don't take part in live interviews or direct interviews," but that they would answer questions sent via email. Over multiple messages they answered a number of questions, but ignored or sidestepped others
Suckers! (Score:3)
If you upload a picture of your face to PimEyes' website, it will immediately show you any pictures of yourself that the company has found around the internet.
And if there are no pictures of you on the 'net, (as I suspect is the case for me), and you upload to PimEyes, guess what?
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And if there are no pictures of you on the 'net, (as I suspect is the case for me), and you upload to PimEyes, guess what?
Then the only matching photo is in their system, and their servers get trapped in a recursive loop?
big failure. (Score:3)
Well people bitch about privacy problems with Clearview, how about this one, letting every one misuse the system people bitch about. You think a system like this is bad in the hands of law enforcement, what do you think in the hands of stupid people who want to misuse the system, especially even easier for criminals. If you ban ClearView you should also ban this.
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There's a few important differences here...
The police have access to non public sources of photos, like passport/driving license records, mugshots, cctv etc. Whereas this one only has access to photos which are already publicly available - ie anyone with enough time could manually trawl for them.
The other difference is what might happen as a result. The problem mostly with the police's use of such software, is that flaws in the software can result in people being incorrectly arrested. And that's really down
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I really don't see the problem of using passports/driving license records, mugshots etc as a source. It's just an automated proces compared to how they used to do it, by hand. Also the system itself isn't the problem, it's the people who use the results of the system. It's just a tool in the process of investigation, one needs more evidence before one can arrest a person and certainly convict. I really don't get the incidents where they solely relied on the result of that system to arrest a person, as there
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The only answer to bad guys with facial recognition software is good guys with facial recognition software. Or something.
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I see it the other way around. The intelligence services will have this. The police, at least in the US, will certainly have this (at worst they will have to make some symbolic attempts at parallel construction for a while). Foreign governments will have this. The most full-time deranged 4chan and SA users will have this.
It's already in the hands of the worst people, so letting stupid people have it as well makes little difference, and may be important for balance of power purposes.
Pretty easy to find the contacts (Score:5, Informative)
https://pimeyes.com/en/premium... [pimeyes.com] list the operator as Face Recognition Solutions Ltd. ...
http://www.facerecognitionsolu... [facerecogn...lution.com] list their primary contact as
JUSTLOOK - FACE RECOGNITION SYSTEM
ADITECH INFOTECH PVT LTD
Ahmedabad, Gujarat
Call : 91-9227070102, 9327049217
That 's in India.
From https://www.zaubacorp.com/comp... [zaubacorp.com] ..
Email ID: manish@aditechinfotech.com
Address: 88/1 GIRDHAR NAGAR SOCOETYSHAHIBAUG AHMEDABAD Ahmedabad GJ 380004 IN
Directors: MUKESH JIVANBHAI PATEL and MANISH BIPINCHANDRA SHAH
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Lol. My guess is that they've harvested social media sites but want more images they can tie to email addresses
and ip addresses.
Re: Pretty easy to find the contacts (Score:2)
Yeah, because shell companies totally aren't a thing ... :P
open with $$ (Score:2)
It's open but not free unless a small subset of pictures that are pixelated is what you want but the sad part is now they have your picture and maybe even a name or ip address or something.
I was hoping for a GitHub project that would be crowd sourced like open maps.
It did occur to me that Google was genius when they gave away their photo application and let you 'tag' your photos, I imagine that data made facial recognition a lot easier for them (see captchas).
Both are privacy Rapists (Score:2)
One is commercial, one is not. Both are privacy rapists.
So anyone who takes a photo of me..... (Score:4, Insightful)
So anyone who takes a photo of me, can upload that photo to this service, and then find every other photo of me on the internet?
Well, that's certainly a useful tool for rapists and hit-men I guess.
"If you upload a picture of your face ..." (Score:2)
lol. Nice try.
Are you attempting to win a cognitive dissoance award or something?