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Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

wired.com

61–70 of 407 posts

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#61
Oh boy, what's bound to be another thread full of "delete your Facebook", the new and improved "I don't own a television" statement. Good for you, some of us actually appreciate the utility value from having a place to plan events and ensure people actually see that sort of thing. That said, this is a completely nonsense "solution" when there's plenty of other ways to perform verification that don't do double duty of implementing facial recognition tech to ensure we get to the dystopian tech hellscape sooner than later.

Wow, didn't take long for the downvote brigade to show up for having a contrary opinion to the herd on this one.

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#63

> The process is automated, including identifying suspicious activity and checking the photo. ... The Facebook spokesperson said the photo test is one of several methods, both automated and manual, used to detect suspicious activity. So I don't get if this "captcha" process is automated or manual (...or both)? Somewhere else in the article it says that users are apparently locked out of their accounts until the pic i…

Couple things. 1.) The face verification is automatic. It is among other processes that are automatic and some other processes that are manual. 2.) Lock out periods are to prevent repeated attempts. 3.) The face has to match the face of the account, so generating a new face won’t work.

Where was it specified that lock-outs are to prevent repeated attempts? It is a plausible reason but the premise of my question (and confusion as to whether this process is automatic or not) stems from:

> ...users are locked out of their accounts _while the photo is being verified_. A message said, “You Can’t Log In Right Now. We’ll get in touch with you _after we’ve reviewed your photo_. You’ll now be logged out of Facebook as a security precaution.”

Emphasis mine.

"after we've reviewed your photo" --> FB can autotag people as pictures are uploaded. Surely they can verify face similarity instantly?

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#64
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They still have your face from scanning your friends' photos and contacts. Combine datestamp, location, messages, and posts over years and Facebook knows who was together for a photo whether or not you've uploaded any or been tagged. Facebook knows the face of everyone who is on Facebook or who knows a few people who are.

I can pull a fingerprint off the subway stair rails but that doesn't mean I can identify who it is. We anonymously reveal ourselves everyday but the danger comes from confirming which data is ours. The goal is to make it difficult not impossible.

Thing is: Grabbing fingerprints from the subway doesn't scale. Machine learning does.

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#65

Last paragraph of the article: "The new authentication scheme is the second in recent weeks that relies on photos. Earlier this month, Facebook asked users to upload nude photos to Facebook Messenger, as part of an effort to prevent revenge porn. Facebook said it would use the nude photos to create a digital fingerprint against which to compare future posts." Wait what? I had to check whether today was April 1st.

Not sure how I feel about it still, but this article doesn't really accurately portray the service. From the source linked by the Wired article [1], this is specifically intended to prevent a nude photo from being shared maliciously when a user has reason to believe that it will be. They then voluntarily upload the image to Facebook which uses the digital fingerprint to prevent it from being reposted either in its original form or with slight modifications. It's always completely voluntary, Facebook is certainly not requiring or even really encouraging average users to upload their nudes.

[1] - https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/9/16630900/facebook-revenge...

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#66
post #21
post #9

I will never do this. I don't even post photos of myself on FB, or use "Messenger" or their mobile app, so it probably wouldn't work anyway, but I have no doubt they're looking to monetize the feature and that businesses and governments are their target markets.

They still have your face from scanning your friends' photos and contacts. Combine datestamp, location, messages, and posts over years and Facebook knows who was together for a photo whether or not you've uploaded any or been tagged. Facebook knows the face of everyone who is on Facebook or who knows a few people who are.

No, not really. There are not many of photos of me on the web and any that are were taken from a distance and too low res to id me.

I've been stingy about that for a long time. FB doesn't have my phone number and I disabled the email address I used to sign up. I delete all my cookies often and use different browsers and turn off and reset my modem to get a new IP address.

I have no apps on my phone, don't use iCloud, and don't use the native "Contacts" app, I made my own for that.

I know I'm still being tracked, but not as much as most and I don't think FB could ID me right now with photos they have.

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#67
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To have the world's best biometric registry that is constantly updated and optimized by it's users.

Yes, I should have been more accurate in my original post - what's the point for the user :-)

This doesn't exist to benefit the user. This exists solely to benefit Facebook.

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#68
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last I checked 2fa on Facebook REQUIRES a phone number to be provided so that your phone is an sms based backup method. Apparently all the talented engineers at Facebook didn't think "oh, let them download a few spares backup codes like ever other service" or that sms based backups are a stupid idea.

Backup codes are available, once you've enabled 2FA: https://www.facebook.com/help/148104135383285?helpref=search...

Well... I don't want to legitimize their "need" for my phone number (which granted they already figure out through contact books of others, they don't even hide that they've inferred it). Phones and 2fa are not dependent upon one another.

Re: Facebook’s New Captcha Test: 'Upload a Clear Photo of Your Face'

#70

https://petapixel.com/2017/11/07/ai-creates-photo-realistic-... Tadaa. Another pointless privacy invasion that only affects the fair and honest.

Hmm, this wouldn't help you defeat the system at all, unless I'm missing something. What you need is a model to generate photos of your face.
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