Facial Recognition: a term that refers to a computer's ability to differentiate between individuals and ascertain their identities using the unique qualities of their faces. A term that was long used as a technophobic buzzword and as an interesting concept in dystopian Sci-Fi fantasies is now real life, genuine technology being deployed by police forces, intelligence agencies and militaries across the world. And the software is being trained on your photos.
This article from NBCNews discusses recent findings that Silicon Valley tech giants that are pioneering facial recognition technology have been using photos posted publicly online to train their facial recognition algorithms. This includes photos posted to websites such as Flickr. NBC also found that the process for removing photos from their dataset is convoluted and intentionally unclear.
While facial recognition tech has potential to be extraordinarily useful for government agencies and even in the private sector, it also has a lot of potential for privacy and human rights abuses that need to be a part of the national dialogue about the technology, and the companies developing it need to be held accountable.
For the full article, click HERE.