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The facial recognition company Clearview AI is telling investors it is on track to have 100 billion facial photos in its database within a year, enough to ensure "almost everyone in the world will be identifiable," according to a financial presentation from December obtained by The Washington Post.
Those images — equivalent to 14 photos for each of the 7 billion people on Earth — would help power a surveillance system that has been used for arrests and criminal investigations by thousands of law enforcement and government agencies around the world.
And the company wants to expand beyond scanning faces for the police, saying in the presentation that it could monitor "gig economy" workers and is researching a number of new technologies that could identify someone based on how they walk, detect their location from a photo or scan their fingerprints from afar.
The 55-page "pitch deck," the contents of which have not been reported previously, reveals surprising details about how the company, whose work already is controversial, is positioning itself for a major expansion, funded in large part by government contracts and the taxpayers the system would be used to monitor.
The document was made for fundraising purposes, and it is unclear how realistic its goals might be. The company said that its "index of faces" has grown from 3 billion images to more than 10 billion since early 2020 and that its data collection system now ingests 1.5 billion images a month.
It's a long-format story that is very-well-supported and worth reading in its entirety.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 18 2022, @12:41PM (2 children)
How do we add this company to the "nuke from orbit list"? Any ideas??
Lacking that solution, I suggest that this company will be first against the wall when the revolution comes...(like Douglas Adams' Sirius Cybernetics Corporation).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Saturday February 19 2022, @01:29AM (1 child)
Cops have been wanting facial recognition for at least 25 years now. If they get what they want, it's going to be abused. Law enforcement's expectations about the capabilities are way off. They think it can be near perfect. It won't be, it's going to have lots and lots of false positives and negatives. I wonder if this business really appreciates the tremendous difficulties in scaling up to millions of people? It's one thing to implement facial recognition for a thousand people. Quite another for millions. Well, another possibility is that this company is suckering the buyers. Anyone in this business knows that law enforcement and other government agencies want this so bad they are susceptible to being conned.
But like many did with highly fallible drugs tests, if they get it, law enforcement is going to run with the thought that facial recognition is perfect. I saw that same kind of b.s. thinking with traffic light cameras. I went to a hearing and questioned the accuracy, and they brushed that argument aside. I brought evidence that the lights were mistimed. They didn't even look at it. For purposes of determining guilt or innocence, the hearing operated as if the system was beyond question. I was told I could raise those questions in municipal court, but I'd already wasted enough time on the hearing. It wasn't the main reason I went anyway. It was in part for the experience, which I did find somewhat interesting, and in part to make sure the city did not profit off the fine they imposed on me. That's what traffic light cameras really are, of course, a backhanded way to generate revenue, with fears over an imaginary epidemic of red light light running and public safety the b.s. excuse, so I was sure the hearing would not be fair. However, I'm also sure it cost them more to hold the hearing than they got from me. Nevertheless, I gave it my best shot, went in there with what I hoped were real chances, however faint, of winning.
There could be thrilling unintended consequences to facial recognition. How about, attendance at rock concerts drops 90% because there's a system that not only does facial recognition, but also intoxication recognition that's so good they can tell what you're on? A positive outcome is even possible. That is, suppose the technology catches so many people that the law has to be changed, resulting in the decriminalization of a whole lot of things that should never have been criminal in the first place? Such as, drug usage. And downloading.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Saturday February 19 2022, @04:09AM
Fun fact: In AU speed cameras and radar guns are beyond questioning. The Acts governing them actually give them the status of "calibrated scientific instruments" and you cannot dispute their accuracy in court.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.