[10653] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
'We {Will} Find you...'
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Paul Robinson)
Thu Mar 3 23:55:34 1994
Date: Wed, 2 Mar 1994 23:17:29 -0500 (EST)
From: Paul Robinson <PAUL@tdr.com>
Reply-To: Paul Robinson <PAUL@tdr.com>
To: Comp Privacy <COMP-PRIVACY@uwm.edu>,
>From: Paul Robinson <PAUL@TDR.COM>
Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA
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'We _will_ find you...'
In an article on the cover of the February 10, 1994 {Washington
Technology} magazine of the same name, talks about a specialized use of
biometrical information (specific details unique to a person like size,
etc.) to identify them.
The idea behind this is that in an airport, an infrared camera is mounted
near the arriving passengers section, taking pictures of every person who
is passing through the facility. This captures the 'aura' or underlying
facial vascular system (pattern of blood vessels and such). In 1/30 of
one second, it captures the data and forwards it via high-speed data lines
to an FBI database that has stored auras of the worlds most-wanted
criminals and terrorists, then matches generate an order to nab a suspect,
supposedly producing "a piece of evidence that is as rock-solid as any
presented to a court."
Currently, infrared cameras are being attached to desktop computers to
create digitized thermograms of people's faces in 1/30 of a second. The
company that is working on this technology, Betae Corp, an Alexandria, VA
government contractor, claims that the aura is unique for every single
person. The photos in the front of the article show two clearly
different thermographic images that are claimed to be from identical twins.
The facial print does not change over time (and would allegedly require
very deep plastic surgery to change it), retains the same basic patterns
regardless of the person's health, and can be captured without the
person's participation. The technology will have to show it is a better
choice than current biometric techniques such as retinagrams (eye
photographs, voice prints and the digital fingerprint.
A Publicity-Shy Reston, VA company called Mikos holds the patent for
certain technology uses of this concept. Dave Evans of Betac who has
obtained certain "non exclusive" rights in the technology claims that
"thermograms are the only technology he has seen in his more than two
decades of security work that meet the five major criteria of an ideal
identification system: They are unique for every individual, including
identical twins; they identify individuals without their knowing
participation; they perform IDs on the fly; they are invulnerable to
counterfeiting or disguises; they remain reliable no matter the subject's
health or age," the article said. Only retinal photos are equivalent,
but potential assasins aren't likely to cooperate in using them.
Right now it takes about 2-4K per thermograph, (it says '2-4K of computer
memory' but I suspect they mean disk space) and that's not really a
problem for a PC-Based system of 2000 or so people going to and from a
building; it's another magnitude of hardware to handle millions of
aircraft travelers in airports. Also, infrared cameras are not cheap, in
the $35,000 to $70,000 range, which, for the moment is likely to keep
small law enforcement facilities from thermographing all persons arrested
the way all persons arrested are routinely fingerprinted. But we can
expect the price to come down in the future.
The writer apparently had to agree with Evans not to raise privacy and
security issues in the article, it says, since first they have to show
the technology works. But even it raised questions:
- The technology could be a powerful weapon in a "big brother" arsenal,
with cameras in front of many stores and street corners, scanning for
criminals or anyone on the government's watch list?
- Does the government have the right to randomly photograph people for
matching them against a criminal database?
- What guarantees do we have that thermographs are actually unique for
every person, or that the system is foolproof?
- What is the potential for blackmail, with thermographs to prove people
were in compromising places and positions?
There are also my own points
- While this can be used to protect nuclear power plants against
infiltration by terrorists (as one example it gives), what is to stop it,
for example, to be used to find (and silence or eliminate) critics and
dissidents? I wouldn't give China 30 seconds before it would use
something like this to capture critics such as the victims of Tianamen
Square.
- Long history indicates that better technology is not used to improve
capture of criminals who violate the lives and property of other private
parties, it is used to go after whatever group the government opposes.
That's why people who defend themselves with guns against armed
criminals in places where gun controls are in effect, can expect to
be treated harsher than the criminal would have been. Existence of
criminals supports the need for more police and more police-state laws;
defending oneself against criminals shows the ineffectiveness of those
laws.
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Paul Robinson - Paul@TDR.COM
Voted "Largest Polluter of the (IETF) list" by Randy Bush <randy@psg.com>
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