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Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

engineering.princeton.edu

21–30 of 105 posts

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#21

So privacy will evaporate. Imagine dropping millions of these from a drone, carpeting a city. They'd be carried everywhere on clothing, animals, wind. Go to any location and scan for local cameras, download. Privacy will have to be redefined. We've done this lots of times. You hear what goes on behind the bathroom door, you don't say anything, you actually forget it. Because it's not polite to snoop. So in future eve…

> Imagine dropping millions of these from a drone, carpeting a city. Doesn't it still need a source of power?

There's at least some power to be pulled from ambient radio waves. No idea if it would be enough to power these things.

https://phys.org/news/2017-08-ambient-energy-power-internet....

Or combine it with photovoltaics:

https://www.smart2zero.com/news/self-powered-camera-sensor-c...

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#23

So privacy will evaporate. Imagine dropping millions of these from a drone, carpeting a city. They'd be carried everywhere on clothing, animals, wind. Go to any location and scan for local cameras, download. Privacy will have to be redefined. We've done this lots of times. You hear what goes on behind the bathroom door, you don't say anything, you actually forget it. Because it's not polite to snoop. So in future eve…

Counter snooping measures will likely be developed in parallel. Maybe localized EMP or something that floods sensors with infrared light or whatever.

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#24
post #6

That guy Felix Heide is a research powerhouse. He and his group published 4 papers in SIGGRAPH 21, 7 papers in CVPR 21 and 6 papers in CVPR 2020, wow. https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~fheide/

This usually implies he has great funding sources and very large lab. Being a "powerhouse" as a researcher is probably a different thing.

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#25
post #6

That guy Felix Heide is a research powerhouse. He and his group published 4 papers in SIGGRAPH 21, 7 papers in CVPR 21 and 6 papers in CVPR 2020, wow. https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~fheide/

Are we seeing more people on this path where you get tenure (has to be one of the most secure jobs possible) and then launch companies from that foundation? It meshes so well, incredibly competitive though. Perhaps I’m just noticing more.

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#26
post #24
post #6

That guy Felix Heide is a research powerhouse. He and his group published 4 papers in SIGGRAPH 21, 7 papers in CVPR 21 and 6 papers in CVPR 2020, wow. https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~fheide/

This usually implies he has great funding sources and very large lab. Being a "powerhouse" as a researcher is probably a different thing.

I know nothing about this person, but if his case is the average, he's probably got a lot of grad students doing the actual work.

I can't tell you how many papers/patents I wrote only to be listed as the 5th contributor or some such thing.

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#27

…something something privacy…

even if banned legally, the amounts of illegal surveillance will be mindboggling. It'll only keep shrinking, until it is the size of dust particles, just another order of magnitude. How do you prevent dust-cameras from being around? a pre-emptive EMP pulse lol?

You are overthinking here:

1- Actually, the main problem with privacy is that most people still doesnt really care and many more underestimates its current reach, if this were somehow to happen, proably it would raise awareness and that is of topmost priority. 2- Its is already mindboggling. 3- A spy needs privacy to spy.

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

even if banned legally, the amounts of illegal surveillance will be mindboggling. It'll only keep shrinking, until it is the size of dust particles, just another order of magnitude. How do you prevent dust-cameras from being around? a pre-emptive EMP pulse lol?

You are overthinking here: 1- Actually, the main problem with privacy is that most people still doesnt really care and many more underestimates its current reach, if this were somehow to happen, proably it would raise awareness and that is of topmost priority. 2- Its is already mindboggling. 3- A spy needs privacy to spy.

No to mention that it would salt the earth :P

Re: Researchers shrink camera to the size of a salt grain

#29

So privacy will evaporate. Imagine dropping millions of these from a drone, carpeting a city. They'd be carried everywhere on clothing, animals, wind. Go to any location and scan for local cameras, download. Privacy will have to be redefined. We've done this lots of times. You hear what goes on behind the bathroom door, you don't say anything, you actually forget it. Because it's not polite to snoop. So in future eve…

> Imagine dropping millions of these from a drone, carpeting a city. Doesn't it still need a source of power?

RFID tags have no power source, and can do significant processing. As others mention, ambient electromagnetic fields can be harvested with a loop antenna.
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