Precrime on the way

[sakthibruce]

As you may know, we're big fans of CCTV in the UK. At the last count there was around 6 million CCTV cameras in the UK, or about one for every ten people living here. Most of these cameras are passive: they don't actually do anything, except for constantly recording to a tape or hard drive.

The big exception is the UK's nationwide automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) system. Here, in addition to storing the data on hard drives, number plates are actively interrogated and matched against a database of missing vehicles and wanted people.

The UK's police and intelligence agencies probably have their own networks that can provide real-time matching, and perhaps also access to other private and public CCTV networks, but that information is obviously hard to come by. Most recently, though, the Metropolitan Police asked for access to Transport for London's ANPR network so that it can carry out real-time facial recognition on all motorists entering London.

Which brings us neatly onto today's interesting bit of news. Facewatch is a system that lets retailers, publicans, and restaurateurs easily share private CCTV footage with the police and other Facewatch users. In theory, Facewatch lets you easily report shoplifters to the police, and to share the faces of generally unpleasant clients/drunks/etc with other Facewatch users. The BBC reports that Facewatch is currently used at around 10,000 premises. The Facewatch website is full of positive testimonials from shop owners and police forces alike; it does seem to work as intended.

Now, however, Facewatch has been updated so that it can be integrated with real-time face recognition systems, such as NEC's NeoFace. Where previously a member of staff had to keep an eye out for people on the crowdsourced Facewatch watch list, now the system can automatically tell you if someone on the watch list has just entered the premises. A member of staff can then keep an eye on that person, or ask them politely (or not) to leave.
Pre-crime

In the film Minority Report, people are rounded up by the Precrime police agency before they actually commit the crime. In the movie this pre-crime information is provided by "pre-cognition" savants floating in a goopy nutrient bath (pictured top) who can apparently see the future.

Replace those gibbering pre-cog mutants with Facewatch, and you pretty much have the same thing: a system that automatically tars people with a criminal brush, irrespective of dozens of important variables.

Read more : http://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-policy/2015/12/pre-crime-arrives-in-the-uk-better-make-sure-your-face-stays-off-the-crowdsourced-watch-list/

[kenjoe41]

Unless i am paid to watch other people buy stock i am too broke to buy, i am never gonna linger around a mall's CCTV watching out for shoplifters.

[fuicious]

Now imagine putting all the guys you don't like on the facewatch wanted list and watching how they're ambushed by police while buying newspaper lol. Joking aside, it sounds cool. I believe there will be a lot of this in the future and I hope it stops a lot of criminals. However, they will need to worry a lot more about hackers since their anti-criminal systems will all be about computers and networks.

[riptorrent]

The problem I see with this ,is that I assume some of those stores turn a blind eye to shoplifting to keep their LP in business and ALE at a certain level to claim insurance etc on certain items. It sounds like an awful system but I am sure here in the states there are private systems that aren't publicly known watching traffic cams etc.  However if I were developing a system like that I would use opencv to profile people by clothing, behaviors etc and then object track their hands and page LP with a smartphone app. I have heard rumors they have facial recognition in some of our stores already. This is a very interesting subject but I think it is fucking terrible the amount of spying going on these days. Creepy isn't the word. Machine learning and human tracking is outrageous. If you want to see some spooky shit and come to your own conclusions http://vpnl.ss.uci.edu/. Note that fMRI satellites aren't new technology whatsoever. You could literally read a shoplifters mind if you wanted to drop the dough.

[r4kk00n]

Now imagine putting all the guys you don't like on the facewatch wanted list and watching how they're ambushed by police while buying newspaper lol. Joking aside, it sounds cool. I believe there will be a lot of this in the future and I hope it stops a lot of criminals. However, they will need to worry a lot more about hackers since their anti-criminal systems will all be about computers and networks.

no, no, just no.
"Well, I guess it is ok to give up our rights if it keeps us safe"
That kind of thinking is what allows governments to become to powerful and exploit the people.

Plus this tech will be abused in other ways. An example:
Homeless people are already often kicked out of public establishments, even when they come  with money to make a purchase.  If it gets to the point where homeless people can't enter an establishment, even as a paying customer, this is  actually going to encourage crime. If a person can not legally obtain what they need to survive, they will find other ways to get it.
Or what if someone caused problems because they were drunk, and so were added to that list.
Let's say a year or two has passed and they have since quit drinking, and worked on the issues that contributed to their previous episode. They are still on the list, and will still be denied entry to  places that use that service, for a mistake they have long since rectified.
It is a terrible idea.

[x40a0e]

While I completely disagree with the mass surveillance going on, I just feel the need to play devil's advocate here.

It doesn't sound like they are actually not allowing people to enter the store or calling the police. Many stores (especially those that have a staff monitoring CCTV) have a bunch of photos they use to identify people that have shoplifted before, which I don't think is unreasonable at all. This sounds like it could be an efficient way of multiple store collaborating on these lists, and helping to just warn, and keep an eye on them. I don't know about the laws in the UK, but here in the US you can't accuse somebody of shoplifting and kick them out, or you will face some big legal/civil consequences. All this being said, I don't think the technology in and of itself is bad, but has a lot of potential to be abused. It is indeed a scary thought.

[fuicious]

no, no, just no.
"Well, I guess it is ok to give up our rights if it keeps us safe"
That kind of thinking is what allows governments to become to powerful and exploit the people.

Plus this tech will be abused in other ways. An example:
Homeless people are already often kicked out of public establishments, even when they come  with money to make a purchase.  If it gets to the point where homeless people can't enter an establishment, even as a paying customer, this is  actually going to encourage crime. If a person can not legally obtain what they need to survive, they will find other ways to get it.
Or what if someone caused problems because they were drunk, and so were added to that list.
Let's say a year or two has passed and they have since quit drinking, and worked on the issues that contributed to their previous episode. They are still on the list, and will still be denied entry to  places that use that service, for a mistake they have long since rectified.
It is a terrible idea.

Well if the police has access to a store's CCTV the staff can be easily seen throwing a homeless guy out, who wanted to buy something legally with money. Without CCTV, they can just tell the police he was causing problems and they'll eat it. So that argument is invalid I'd say.
Same thing with drunks. It's bullshit thinking that once you caused some problems you won't be able to enter any store, anymore. If they don't let you in, they need a reason. And the police is there to see if the reason was a good one, else they can punish the seller.
So yeah, maybe what you're saying is that with the current laws this wouldn't really go well and perhaps that's right.
But introducing the proper regulations before facewatch would make it completely acceptable.

[r4kk00n]

Well if the police has access to a store's CCTV the staff can be easily seen throwing a homeless guy out, who wanted to buy something legally with money. Without CCTV, they can just tell the police he was causing problems and they'll eat it. So that argument is invalid I'd say.
Same thing with drunks. It's bullshit thinking that once you caused some problems you won't be able to enter any store, anymore. If they don't let you in, they need a reason. And the police is there to see if the reason was a good one, else they can punish the seller.
So yeah, maybe what you're saying is that with the current laws this wouldn't really go well and perhaps that's right.
But introducing the proper regulations before facewatch would make it completely acceptable.

I am not sure where you live, so I can not claim to have knowledge of how the law works there.
I can, however, speak from experience as to how the law works where I live (The US). While small details vary from state to state, stores are not public property, so employees can make you leave for almost any reason (the exception being things like race or disability).
The other thing is let's say the cops review the cctv footage (which may or may not have sound) and don't see the person doing anything, the store employee can claim that they said something profane or obscene, and to avoid other customers getting offended, made the person leave. Coming up with an excuse really isn't hard.
And unless you have the money to fight it in court (and most homeless people don't) there is really nothing you can do about it.