Crazy Technologies
While I wholly support technological innovation and using it to deter attacks or to locate criminals/terrorists/all around bad guys, I admit that there are some projects which make me hesitant to make such statements. In Getting the Message, Paul Wallich discusses technology resources which are being developed to assist ‘intelligence needs.’ Two of the more intriguing and also frightening technologies are face and gait recognition.
Wallich also discusses speech programs in the article. It is understandable that the government would want to create programs which do real time and accurate translation of languages. The language instruction in the US compared to other nations is lacking and recruitment of native speakers of desirable languages is difficult. And, it would greatly assist analysts if they could determine a command from a joke without listening to an entire conversation.
The intrusiveness of the face and now gait recognition makes the hairs on my neck stand up. The HumanID program’s goal is to recognize faces at a distance using ‘face-matching recognition.’ Our fears are only mildly relieved by knowing “[no program] has demonstrated the kind of selectivity required for large public venues – air-ports, say.” Likewise, gait recognition “recognizes the hitches and rhythms characteristic of a person’s walk.” How do we determine a known criminal or terrorists walk? And how do you explain away a false positive?
With all the hubbub against data-mining or using technology to search accessible information, there seems to be little attention on these intrusive innovations. It is important to use technology to the extent that it assists analysts in removing the white noise; however there is a fine line between accessing available information and subjecting entire populations to recognition programs. I can only hope that our civil liberties will fight these mass uses to ensure that our society is not forced to operate like some sci-fi movie, such as Minority Report, scanning our retinas/faces/walks/runs/etc to determine who we are; and if we are ‘good’ or ‘bad’.