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European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

politico.eu

61–70 of 160 posts

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#61
post #49
post #12

Ah, yes, the European Parliament. They have a great track record regulating technology, not at all like a bunch of out of touch clueless boomers. I'm sure something as complex as facial recognition is well within their capabilities to comprehend.

Oh hey, dumb baseless rhetoric! It's ridiculous to describe this age distribution as "a bunch of out of touch boomers": https://nonempty.org/stuff/screenshot_20211006-174820_i708Ao...

Yeah, I was clearly wrong on that point.

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#62
post #50
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Criticism of the EU on this point ≠ the US is better at it. It's not a competition of "my politicians are better than yours". Almost _all_ of the EU's legislation on anything tech related has been playing to the voters by beating the privacy drum, without actually addressing the underlying issues. Meanwhile, the EU slides farther and farther into irrelevancy when it comes to being anything other than consumers of tec…

> Meanwhile, the EU slides farther and farther into irrelevancy when it comes to being anything other than consumers of tech. All the EU seems capable of doing is creating additional bureaucracy while hamstringing Europeans trying to actually realize Europe's potential in the field. What are you talking about?

Not the person you are addressing, but I believe he is referring to the somewhat common belief (in North America) that it is foolish to try to start a tech company in Europe due to the regulatory and business environment.

The results bear this out, there just aren’t many European tech companies that reach global relevancy.

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An argument here is that it disincentivizes others from doing similar crimes. If the technology is so spot on that 99% of the time you commit the crime you'll get caught, then others will likely not take the risk. Granted there's an easy counter argument there (all the more prescient these days) that they could wear a mask while committing the crime. There's a similar (less discussed about) trend happening these days…

> If the technology is so spot on that 99% of the time you commit the crime you'll get caught And in 1% of the time[1], you are an innocent who had nothing to do with the crime. Now you have to spend your time: getting arrested, spending time with lawyers, getting people to collaborate your alibi ( If you want to make a case for facial recognition, criminal justice is one of worst possible cases you could make for it…

The 1% there is that “the criminal won’t get caught”. Not that someone else, an innocent bystander, will get caught.

Also what you described can happen to you today as well. It’s the imperfect system we live in.

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this can be disrupted, here it is a startup idea but probably Google and Amazon are already working on it 1 offer all shops free surveillance hardware, you will offer them notifications when a suspect enters the shop. You need some PR stuff with big numbers where you claim on how many of your partners/clients are marking suspects that commited theft and how many billions are saved with this AI tech. 2 collect all…

I doubt that this would happen.

Why do you think so? Because of bad Pr Google and Amazon will not do it ? but will some other company do it ?

It could be done with "google glasses" like devices too, why do you think it will not happen? Because of existing laws or because there is no money for a big corporation to extract?

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#65
post #7

How did the EU become such a bunch of luddites? Or does it only seem that way from outside? I get that there are legit concerns about face recognition (as there are benefits), but the concerns _could_ be regulated. Granted, regulation is a much more work intensive process – you have to sit down with a large number of people, get educated on the subject etc. Is it laziness? Or is this a negotiation tactic? Start askin…

It's a terrible headline, but this is regulation, not a ban. This would ban most police use, and would ban private mass surveillance, but would not ban, say, FaceID.

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#66
post #2

The subtitle is also important: Non-binding resolution also asks for AI-based predictive policing ban. AI, by its complexity and opacity should not be used to profile people. Just because it could be so easily manipulated.

Why are opacity and complexity so often invoked as a reason here? I don’t want to be mass-profiling populations with totally clear and simple technologies, either.

Opacity because if you are detained by the police they should be able to tell you why. Many, if not all, AI solution based on a training sets will have a hard time telling you exactly why you where flagged.

Also even if they can tell you that the AI believe that the combination of your ears and nose makes you look like some wanted person, what are you suppose to do about it?

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this can be disrupted, here it is a startup idea but probably Google and Amazon are already working on it 1 offer all shops free surveillance hardware, you will offer them notifications when a suspect enters the shop. You need some PR stuff with big numbers where you claim on how many of your partners/clients are marking suspects that commited theft and how many billions are saved with this AI tech. 2 collect all…

I doubt that this would happen.

Yea I think: - Google and Amazon etc won’t touch it cause it is bad PR - stores won’t buy it cause it’s bad PR; fear of boycotting etc. - physical retail is already on the decline; why spend money in a dying industry - the whole project would have one big flaw - people wearing masks

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#68
post #50
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Criticism of the EU on this point ≠ the US is better at it. It's not a competition of "my politicians are better than yours". Almost _all_ of the EU's legislation on anything tech related has been playing to the voters by beating the privacy drum, without actually addressing the underlying issues. Meanwhile, the EU slides farther and farther into irrelevancy when it comes to being anything other than consumers of tec…

> Meanwhile, the EU slides farther and farther into irrelevancy when it comes to being anything other than consumers of tech. All the EU seems capable of doing is creating additional bureaucracy while hamstringing Europeans trying to actually realize Europe's potential in the field. What are you talking about?

https://www.politico.eu/article/pr-problem-high-flying-start...

Relevant bits to this particular point.

> For investors, the European market is less overheated and so more attractive to participate in than the U.S. market and less "tough" than China, Russia or Brazil. But that's not thanks to the EU. Systemic problems, like a lack of harmonization across the Continent, mean EU startups have to spend a lot of energy on learning and complying with varying rules, like hiring non-EU recruits or rewarding employees with stock options … Patrick Collison, of fintech giant Stripe, advocates for a "more streamlined common market, fewer impractical and ineffective regulations, better legal treatment of stock options and easier access to visas for highly skilled individuals." … "The startup community has been saying the same things for over 10 years," said Simon Schaefer, president of Startup Portugal. "We always said: this is alert signal code red. If we don't harmonize Europe, we'll never be able to catch up with the U.S. and China."

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#69
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if face images also are acquired from a legitimate investigation (ideally a prior criminal conviction). Police cannot observe a face for years until they get a warrant then all suddenly have years of data, that is wrong.

I'm not really sure why we've normalized the collection of biometrics during police investigations that are kept forever. I know deleting them would defeat the purpose of the fingerprint/DNA databases but if we're gonna do this either collect and keep everyone's biometrics or no ones because creating two classes of people, those who have had run-ins with the police and not, is gross.

Not only people who have had run ins with the police - when I took an entry level job at a bank I had to go and submit my prints to the local gov (via an expensive third party of course) as part of my onboarding requirements (and run a background check). These are now stored forever in some police database; I would guess there are some other jobs like that, maybe government employees as well.

Re: European Parliament Calls for a Ban on Facial Recognition

#70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely!

Why not? Concrete use case: many property crimes have a minimum cutoff (a felony only if more than $X is stolen or damaged). So to convict someone who knows the letter of the law and regularly engages in some mischief under the cutoff amount, you will need to gather video evidence over a long time period - a period during which the person technically hadn't hit the felony threshold yet.

Because a free society is a finely tuned balance between state power and individual freedom, and the pendulum is on the far side of state power since 9/11 anyways.

The same thing that can be used to find perpetrators in minor crimes can also be used to trace political movements, that any given government happens to dislike.

IMO there are certain uncertaintiws that any free society has to accept. One of those is that not every perpetrator will be punished. Not because there wouldn't be a way, but because a society in which this would be implemented wouldn't be free anymore.

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