Wales Police Begin Using a Facial-Recognition Phone App (bbc.co.uk) 36
"There are concerns human rights will be breached," reports the BBC, as Wales police forces launch a facial-recognition app that "will allow officers to use their phones to confirm someone's identity."
The app, known as Operator Initiated Facial Recognition (OIFR), has already been tested by 70 officers across south Wales and will be used by South Wales Police and Gwent Police. Police said its use on unconscious or dead people would help officers to identify them promptly so their family can be reached with care and compassion. In cases where someone is wanted for a criminal offence, the forces said it would secure their quick arrest and detention. Police also said cases of mistaken identity would be easily resolved without the need to visit a police station or custody suite.
Police said photos taken using the app would not be retained, and those taken in private places such as houses, schools, medical facilities and places of worship would only be used in situations relating to a risk of significant harm.
Liberty, a civil liberties group, is urging new privacy protections from the government, according to the article, which also includes this quote from Jake Hurfurt, of the civil liberties/privacy group Big Brother Watch. "In Britain, none of us has to identify ourselves to police without very good reason but this unregulated surveillance tech threatens to take that fundamental right away."
Police said photos taken using the app would not be retained, and those taken in private places such as houses, schools, medical facilities and places of worship would only be used in situations relating to a risk of significant harm.
Liberty, a civil liberties group, is urging new privacy protections from the government, according to the article, which also includes this quote from Jake Hurfurt, of the civil liberties/privacy group Big Brother Watch. "In Britain, none of us has to identify ourselves to police without very good reason but this unregulated surveillance tech threatens to take that fundamental right away."
Yeah right (Score:4, Insightful)
The same youth who are quite happy putting endless pictures of themselves and their friends and everything they do in life online to be slurped up and digested by all the social media companies in order to become part of the product and have their face recognised anywhere in the world by facial recognition systems? Is that the youth you're talking about?
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Even if that was true (and you will find they are a lot more savvy these days), there is clearly a big difference in consequences here.
If some copper's dodgy phone camera doesn't cope with your skin tone, it's a potentially huge problem.
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Unwoke: Somebody who doesn't understand that society's accommodation for mental illness requires understanding that society cannot actually force the mentally ill to go to a therapist without locking them away and forcing them to listen to a therapist because they are a fuckwit who thinks that only the mentally ill would get locked away, not their brother whom no one likes.
Society can do that ... (Score:2)
... society cannot actually force the mentally ill to go to a therapist without locking them away and forcing them to listen to a therapist ...
There's your problem, society can absolutely do so when the person is a danger to themselves or others. Perhaps you can quibble about the danger of self harm, but not when there is danger of harm to others. It's one of the basic functions of civilization.
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How does it handle errors? (Score:5, Insightful)
Police also said cases of mistaken identity would be easily resolved without the need to visit a police station or custody suite.
How? If the app identifies you as someone they need to arrest for some crime and you do not have any ID on you then it is hard to imagine that the police are not going to take you to the station until the problem gets resolved because otherwise every real criminal is just going to claim that the system has misidentified them.
That's the problem with systems like these. For them to be useful the police have to trust what it is telling them and when the system makes a mistake you have then automatically lost any presumption of innocence, at least when it comes to getting detained and arrested. Given how often a facial recognition system like this could be used each day even a 99% accuracy rate will likely result in tens if not hundreds of mis-identification cases every day. Unless you have a system where the errors rate is less than ~1e-6 or better then the inevitable result of this is that either police stop trusting the output, in which case it is useless, or so many people are falsely accused and then detained that public opinion forces them to stop using it.
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Pepperidge farm remembers.
This is like with fingerprints and DNA. Its never as accurate as they make it out in court. But since it doesnt disrupt everyone it doesnt stir up problems for them.
Re: How does it handle errors? (Score:2)
Where did you get the idea that DNA isnâ(TM)t accurate?
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Where did you get the idea that DNA isnâ(TM)t accurate?
Defense attorneys hoping for one idiot on the jury.
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Remember how it doesnt work well with black people and gets better the lighter your skin?
This is like with fingerprints and DNA. It's never as accurate as they make it out in court.
Not a problem, it's not evidence I need court. When a person has no ID, unlikely, it's a place to start an investigation. Its more accurate than human witness identification.
Protecting your job (Score:2)
Certain crimes have arrests made much more often than others because the risk to the officer's job, police department lawsuits, etc. are so much larger than the mistake of arresting someone who has done no wrong.
This is why the 'pass the buck' happens, it's the next step in the judicial process responsibility once the arrest is made. If an arrest is not made and the person which was not arrested kills someone, the officer in question is risking his or her job.
Google "predominant aggressor training"
https:// [cnn.com]
Humans and software double check each other (Score:2)
Certain crimes have arrests made much more often than others because the risk to the officer's job, police department lawsuits, etc. are so much larger than the mistake of arresting someone who has done no wrong.
You left out danger to the lives or well being of the public.
You present nothing new. Erroneous identification can lead to an arrest, again witness identification by humans can often be inaccurate as well, less accurate than software.
You present nothing relevant. Facial recognition is part of the investigatory process, which can lead to interview, detention, or arrest. It is NOT, itself, a basis for persecution. No more than computer software that identifies a blob in an x-ray is a basis for surgery.
Disagree - Higher arrest rate is a punishment (Score:2)
You are missing the point that arrest, loss of freedom, getting an arrest record, being in a holding cell (which endangering the arrested person's life) is a punishment even if the person is later released from police custody without charge, or goes to trial and is found not guilty.
Assuming that the arrest comes at no cost to the arrested person is disingenuous.
Police are significantly more likely to arrest certain demographic groups than others for similar situations. At each stage of the criminal judici
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You are missing the point that arrest, loss of freedom, getting an arrest record, being in a holding cell (which endangering the arrested person's life) is a punishment even if the person is later released from police custody without charge, or goes to trial and is found not guilty.
Which again, is irrelevant. Your assumption that facial recognition increases arrest rates is unproven. Software is not the decision maker, software provides information to humans who will make the ultimate decision. Humans still look at the photos software recognition provides and compare them to the person standing in front of them. This will likely be an improvement over human witness identification with is know for inaccuracy.
I realize differential outcomes is your thing, you want to inject it, but s
Disagree (Score:2)
Facial recognition by police leads to more interactions of people with police, with each interaction having a percentage chance of an arrest, leading to higher arrest rates than without facial recognition.
Each arrest has a percent chance to lead to being charged, being tried, being convicted and serving jail time.
Consider police being prevented from checking each car passing on a road as a general crime control method. Facial recognition is a version of checking each person the officer passes by.
https://ww [nolo.com]
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Facial recognition by police leads to more interactions of people with police, ...
Nope. We're talking about hand held devices that officers will carry and use when they directly interact with people.
You are trying to interject something else.
Each arrest has a percent chance to lead to being charged, being tried, being convicted and serving jail time.
Not really. People are not convicted because they were initially identified via facial recognition, which was then followed up with human confirmation. Facial recognition is an investigatory tool, not a prosecutorial tool.
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You have identified the same bad claim I have. And this one statement makes me question the motive of the whole damn thing, because you are absolutely correct. No one will avoid a trip to the station if The System says you’re a wanted felon. And The System will be deemed never wrong eventually.
Even when the system is wrong, the major problem is affording to defend yourself. Most average citizens can’t, but they’ll certainly be forced to. Is fear and profit the real motive here?
Its like computer assisted medical imagery scans (Score:2)
No one will avoid a trip to the station if The System says you’re a wanted felon.
Just like a human witness identification, which is less accurate. We're talking about enough suspicion to warrant investigation, we are NOT talking about evidence in court.
... the major problem is affording to defend yourself. Most average citizens can’t, but they’ll certainly be forced to. Is fear and profit the real motive here?
No. The motive is an investigative tool. There is still a human operator who can use their judgement to compare the official photo of the "identified" person to the person standing in front of them and say no, the software is wrong. Its is like computer software that scans medical imagery for potential tumors and other anomalies. The sof
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Its just a place to start investigating ... (Score:2)
... when the system makes a mistake you have then automatically lost any presumption of innocence, at least when it comes to getting detained and arrested ...
No, interview, detention or arrest do not impact your presumption of innocence. The latter only require a reasonable suspicion, they are part of the investigatory process.
Given how often a facial recognition system like this could be used each day even a 99% accuracy rate will likely result in tens if not hundreds of mis-identification cases every day.
Your estimated low ball accuracy rate is better than eye witness identification. That's the goal here. If a person has no ID on them, which is unrealistic, its a reasonable first step. Again, its not a positive identification, its a place to start investigating..
Unless you have a system where the errors rate is less than ~1e-6 or better then the inevitable result of this is that either police stop trusting the output
Facial recognition is not used as evidence in court, its just a place to star
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Anytime someone claims something like it is unrealistic for people not to have ID on them it demonstrates they either aren't British or are incredibly out of touch with the wider population of their country which somewhat undermines any other points they are making. It's common not to carry ID in the UK, especially people who don't drive.
I'm in the US, but I have intentionally left the house without my wallet. Taking the dog for a walk around the neighborhood for example. And you know what would happen in the unlikely event that the police requested ID? I'd go home, they'd follow me (dog) or drive me home (no dog) and I'd get my wallet and show them my ID. If they had a facial recognition scanner and brought up my driver's license info and confirmed I was who I said I was that would be great. If the facial recognition made a mistake, they c
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There are already a depressing number of cases, disproportionately black, people who are systemically harrassed by police, even if not intentionally by individual officers, because they 'look'
The question is (Score:2)
Where are they getting the images to compare against? If only from the police criminal DB then thats not going to be much use for identifying A.N Other person who's been in a fatal accident or similar. If they're getting the images from social media then that opens up a hole can of worms and will simply mean that any criminal with brains (yeah, a bit of an ask) will simply not use social media , at least to post pictures of themselves anyway.
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Chinese facial recognition systems are used in airports all over the world. And they've been scraping social media accounts for a LONG time. And maybe, Chinese definitions of "criminal" aren't exactly the same as Western countries.....although it does seem they have started to merge in the past several years.
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Prove your Motive. (Score:5, Interesting)
Police also said cases of mistaken identity would be easily resolved without the need to visit a police station or custody suite.
If the police cannot do this today, the hell makes anyone assume they can do this when The System (facial false-recognition) blatantly informs them a (mistaken) criminal is in front of them?
If The System thinks you’re Fucky McFuckface the Felon, you are going to get arrested. You will be taken to a police station. And you will be forced to spend a lot of money (now we’re getting somewhere as to motive) defending a false accusation. Just as anyone would today.
Only difference tomorrow is The System will be considered much more credible than you. For lot-of-money reasons of course.
Facial Rec starts investigation not prosecution (Score:2)
... If The System thinks you’re Fucky McFuckface the Felon, you are going to get arrested. You will be taken to a police station.
No. If the software says this might be a wanted person the human operator then uses their own judgment comparing the official photo of the wanted person to the person standing in front of them. It's very much like software scanning medical imagery. When the software says this blob in the x-ray might be cancer you are not rushed to surgery, a doctor looks at the suspected blob brought to their attention and an investigation begins. Facial recognition starts an investigation, not a prosecution.
And you will be forced to spend a lot of money (now we’re getting somewhere as to motive) defending a false accusation.
No. You will b
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I have no intention of defending the tech, but th
Copying the Chinese? (Score:2)
Chinese police on the streets of Beijing were using this tech 6 years ago.
Cheap Click (Score:2)
Wales (Score:3)
Wasn't TORCHWOOD (based in Cardiff) doing this already?
Rights aren't taken away... (Score:1)
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