In a world were privacy has virtually become non-existant and no one can be trusted, Google has just further blurred the lines by adding "Facial Recognition Technology" to the mix. The way it works is that someone can take a picture of you with your mobile phone and the technology will run the photo through a database(including social media and data sites) and will send that PRIVATE information back to the person who ran the query. Scary isn't it? This type of technology has already been integrated into sites such as Flickr and Picasa where you are able to tag someone and then the site uses facial recognition to suggest other photos to tag your friends in. Now it may seem like a convenience to tag your friends with one click but you may want to think twice next time.
Of course, with breakthrough technology comes concerns of privacy and how it will be affected and with Google's Facial Recognition it has become a huge concern. The main one being that a complete stranger can track you just by a random photo taken of you another one being, who is this information being shared with? If it is so easy to pull up your information through a cell phone picture, then who knows who else has access to your private information and whereabouts. Such concerns have pushed back the release of the new technology and Google has tried to quell concerns by offering some ways to ensure security (but nothing is ever really safe):
1. To send only one of the "identifiers" to the person searching.
2. To possibly allow only the person identified to make the photo public. 3. To send a request after a person is positively identified, asking if the image can be a face search result for other people's visual queries from within their social network.
We have the right to be concerned, most of our lives are posted online for everyone to see and although we should know that is a risk we are taking when posting pictures and information we should also have some sense of privacy and know that others will not be using our privacy to their advantage. So next time you're out in public, be careful what you do and where you step, you might just upset someone and all it takes is s simple picture from a cell phone and all your information and whereabouts is in their hands.
Alexa, I think that it’s great that you brought up the issues of privacy invasion when it comes to Google’s new facial recognition technology. It’s really scary to think that someone could research all of a persons information with just a picture. The one thing that a person should be allowed to have is their privacy. A person should be allowed to choose who they want to view their personal facts, no one else should have the authority to display and send around the information unless they were granted that permission. Nowadays adults have the guilty pleasure of posting a lot of personal information such as pictures, their current location, and other personal information all over different social networking websites forgetting who can access their information. I am against Google’s facial recogniation technology because it might sound great to be able to identify or locate a person whether it’s a family member or a friend that you’ve lost touch with, but the bad part about it is that this technology is a great tool for stalkers to be able to track down their enemies. The bottom line is that facial recognition tecnology can be used for the good or for the bad. I wasn’t aware that the website Flickr was starting to use this technology, thank you for informing me about that.
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ReplyDeleteAlexa I think your concerns are very valid, and I completely agree with you that we have to be careful in what we post because everyone is watching. We have to remember that the internet as a whole is just one giant network that spans the entire world. All of the social websites and their tools such as photo tagging can sometimes only facilitate people with malicious intents from realizing their goals. With that said we have to really think if the pros outweigh the cons. Also who remembers a few years back when all of these websites first made our personal information like our addresses available to anyone with a computer and $9.95?
ReplyDeleteThose security options Google is offering will be somewhat reassuring for the present and will make it easier for us to accept it at first. However, I think that it will be a slippery slope after the system is in place. Once the ball is rolling, where will it stop? I also believe that if we post it online, we should expect it to go everywhere and to be accessible to everyone, but perhaps with advancing technology, privacy tools might also be advanced? This could eventually be used for good. You know those awkward pictures of us that get uploaded? We could use this system to monitor our personal online presence and possibly control it a little more.
ReplyDeleteWe are not naive to the fact that while the internet has its advantages of sharing information and making everything closer and easier, it also has its uncontrollable flaws. Those flaws are exploited by people who want power at any cost. The cost now is our privacy. Before it was given to us as optional. You will be the one deciding what to post, what to say, who to tag. Now that we have let it grow; it has become a force bigger than our expectations.
ReplyDeleteI do not agree with this whole new technology that has nothing to offer but to intrude in someone's way of being.
What about the people who are in witness protection programs? they have been given the opportunity of a new life without any worries. They are there for a reason and now their whole integrity could be compromised.
We can choose to not use this new applications, that way we can diminish the interest and respect our privacy and that of others we don't need or want to know.
I just think the whole idea that we have be careful of taking pictures is crazy. You are so right we do have the right to be concerned about this. Its is compromising our safety on he internet. Its just sad that we have to be aware of every little thing whaler we are out in a public face because one wrong step and all your information can be compromised.
ReplyDeleteThis is crazy. It definitely raises concerns about or right to privacy. Though putting up our photos and personal information about ourselves can be quite risky, I feel as though because of the advancement of technology in communicating with distant friends and relatives privacy should be ensured. At the end its all politics and about money to most of these CEOS that create this typr of social media.
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