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Academic and company research groups have developed augmented reality applications, which superimpose virtual objects and information on top of the real world, for more than a decade. But until the past year or so, all of these prototype applications required bulky headsets and laptop computers. With more powerful sensors, cameras, and microprocessors built into mobile phones, however, augmented reality applications have begun hitting the mainstream. Several apps take advantage of the GPS chips and compasses available in newer smart phones. For example, PresseLite's Metro Paris app and Acrossair's Nearest Tube provide iPhone users with directions to nearby subway stops.
But Gärdenfors calls such applications "relatively crude." They often obscure objects with labels, he notes, and are sometimes limited by the fact that location information may not be available. He thinks that many augmented reality services could benefit from including elements of computer vision to make information retrieval and label positioning more precise. "This could absolutely work for other kinds of objects, and I think we'll see that soon," he says.
However, Gärdenfors notes that using computer vision to identify buildings and other objects holds challenges that they didn't encounter in developing the augmented ID application. "With facial recognition, it's so obvious what you want to search for," says Gärdenfors. "With other objects, it may be harder to tell which item on the screen you want to identify."
Gärdenfors says that TAT has taken potential privacy concerns with the technology seriously from the beginning. "Facial recognition can be a kind of scary thing, and you could use it for a lot of different purposes." For that reason, the company designed Recognizr as a strictly opt-in service: people would have to upload a photo and profile of themselves, and associate that with different social networks before anyone could use the service to identify them. "You should only be able to look at people who have signed up for this," Gärdenfors says.
A concept video of the augmented ID application that TAT posted on YouTube last summer garnered a great deal of attention. Gärdenfors says the company often uses this strategy to determine which ideas justify further development. A live demonstration also received a lot of interest at the Mobile World Congress. "We're probably going to partner with some company over the next couple of months to take it to the next level and actually build [a product]," Gärdenfors says. While this will require partnerships with a device maker, a mobile service provider, and social networking services, the technology is developed enough that a commercial application could be ready in as little as a month or two, he says.
A malicious site can find out what social-networking groups you belong to--and then figure out your identity.
Researchers plan to offer more than just directions with innovations in software and hardware.
I find it hard to believe that this could work against a database covering more than a handful of people. Face recognition technology is the holy grail of intelligence and law enforcement agencies - the ability to identify the face of a known criminal from a crowd would be invaluable - but no-one has been able to make it work without an unacceptable level of false positives.
If this really works, they'd make far more money marketing it as a law enforcement tool than as a social networking add-on.
The privacy problem would not be such if the application allows the person to be “identified” to accept to be searched. For example, if it allows creating users and they can accept others to “identify” them with the same application. The application obviously needs more development, but it should be in the hands of the person to be searched to allow access to their lives.
Those are well-intentioned ideas, but this technology will be abused very quickly and most certainly without the consent of the victim. Your best approach is to limit your exposure by opting out of such databases, assuming you've not already been added.
These guys are only linking to profiles in various services. If your FB profile is closed to people outside your network then what difference does this product make to your need for privacy? If you don't want to make something public don't add it to your public profile - simple.
e.g. if you don't want random people to know what your last.fm listening preferences are then just don't add it to your profile.
I think this will be amazing at conferences etc. I can create a contact entry with some limited info, maybe my linkedin public profile and link that in this app. Coolness follows :-)
Anyone pointing a cell phone or any other device in my direction to try to "identify" me better be prepared for a either a law suit or a punch in the face.
Umm... suppose it is a hidden camera on their (name one):
pen in front pocket
tie clip
jacket button
jewelry pendant or ring
briefcase
side of sunglasses
in particular, pen cams are popular and are getting smaller and harder to see.
In the end, how is this any different from your brain recognizing people?
I suppose this would be due to the limits of our brain to remember people and we don't (yet) have brain links aka borg to an outside database
I can see this working for a dating site. You go to a public place, point your phone and walk out happily ever after.
I see a lot of potential here for this kind of technology within a few years of becoming ubiquitous turning into a serious privacy issue. As usual the developers, once latched onto a neat idea that they think can generate some revenue, will steadfastly refuse to acknowledge or adequately prepare for the worst. As usual. In the end the public will suffer from yet another invention that was rushed to market without proper planning. As usual. This of course is just a guess. But it's one that is based on all known prior experience, and so I'm thinking it's a pretty damn good guess. I wish the developers would just stop and think ahead for once. But of course it's not their fault either. It's the way our market-driven world is constructed.
Nevertheless here is an adage for this age: Not everything that can be done should be done.
Camera phones were the beginning of the end of offline privacy. Now any nutbag can take a picture (and sometimes video) of you for who-knows-what-reason. If they are savvy enough, they can then upload it and use it for matching someone later. Even on social networks, not everyone reports their location (of if they do use a fake or false one). GPS is another potentially problematic technology. The fact that most of these technologies are on by default and must be turned off manually is a bad precedent. Always it should be opt-in (and at least the peopel working on the program inthis article are aware of this). It's open for abuse by stalkers, law enforcement, ex-significant-others.
Even if you are not opted-in to this program, your picture is still taken. What happens to it if it doesn't match? Is it saved for later just in case someone, who may match in however a superficial way, opt-in?
You can be that the government will be looking to use this technology (law enforcement included).
Are there potentially beneficial uses for this technology? Sure, the the few times it is is far outweighed by the times it isn't. Just like the illegal wiretaps which are done everyone first then sorted later, this is rife for abuse of the same order. Storing information for later matching regardless of the fact that at the time the information is first received, the person is innocent, is a gross abuse of an individual's privacy.
The really sad thing is that most people don't even care or think that this is an issue. The "I don't have anything to hide" crowd do not get it. The point is not about secrecy, it's privacy.
While "1984" was the wrong year, the concept is getting closer to becoming reality.
A New Dimension of Identity Theft
Anyone could take your photo, "volunteer" you to participate in the photo DB, and link it to a bogus facebook account with all kinds of unpleasant stuff in it.
Think about what ex-girlfriends, ex-boyfriends, ex-wives, ex-husbands could do to each other with this!
Re: A New Dimension of Identity Theft
Not to mention future employers, officials, and as medical records go online ... etc. The havoc potential grows expodentially over time.
it´s one thing, if you add a photo of yourself in that database for recognition by recognizr, but i doubt it will remain that user-controlled. maybe you heard of a facerecognition-system for flickr to identify people. And now guess who developed this ... http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10224607-2.html
This combination makes recognizr a real "1984"-tool
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50 Comments
Privacy Invasion
This is beyond scary. Stalkers and psychopaths will love this product. Not to mention law enforcement, especially on the federal level.
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