Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 91 posts

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#61

Post by aendruk »

JohnFen wrote: post #23
crazygringo wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not defending Rite-Aid at all, but that's not the problem here. It's pretty easy for the system to show the source photo to an employee, and then they themselves can judge if they feel confident the shopper is actually the same person. Facial recognition software should always be implemented under the assumption that it makes plenty of false positives, and human review is always necessary. (What you're talking ab…

> It's pretty easy for the system to show the source photo to an employee, and then they themselves can judge if they feel confident the shopper is actually the same person. Yeah, that's not going to happen in any meaningful sense with ordinary employees. Asking them to make a judgement call like that will just result in employees erring on the side of "it could be them, so I confirm" rather than "I'm not sure it's t…

When “I confirm” isn’t just a button but a face-to-face accusation I’d expect people would choose to err in the other direction.

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#62

Post by JohnFen »

aendruk wrote: post #61
JohnFen wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's pretty easy for the system to show the source photo to an employee, and then they themselves can judge if they feel confident the shopper is actually the same person. Yeah, that's not going to happen in any meaningful sense with ordinary employees. Asking them to make a judgement call like that will just result in employees erring on the side of "it could be them, so I confirm" rather than "I'm not sure it's t…

When “I confirm” isn’t just a button but a face-to-face accusation I’d expect people would choose to err in the other direction.

I'd expect employees to act in a way they perceive would be least harmful to themselves and their job. If they incorrectly say someone wasn't the person matched, and that person then proceeds to steal from the store, the employee may (probably correctly) perceive that they'll suffer consequences for the error. The safest direction for them to err in would be "yeah, it's probably them".

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#64

Post by JohnFen »

jrochkind1 wrote: post #7
btbuildem wrote: post #4

> with “largely lower-income, non-white neighborhoods” serving as the technology testbed. There's been plenty of articles pointing out that certain demographics are very under-represented in training sets, leading to all kinds of errors [1] [2]. Technological advances aside, the company should have clearly disclosed their use of facial recognition technology - concealing that raises serious privacy issues. 1: https:/…

Is there any law requiring disclosure of facial recognition? Should there be? I don't know if there is, but don't think so? I think there probably should be -- but also, it'll be just another fine-print fades-into-landscape thing. All the signs about video monitoring don't really matter much, we just assume there's video monitoring everywhere and don't even notice the signs anymore. I assume facial recognition will s…

I think there definitely should be. I wouldn't want to set foot in a place that did this, and would be really angry if I discovered that a place was secretly doing this because it would rob me of my ability to protect myself.

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#65

Post by twisteriffic »

the_doctah wrote: post #53
twisteriffic wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your insistence on framing people falsely accused of shoplifting as law breakers is telling.

suspected law breakers then? Fucking semantics people. Also telling.

This entire thread has been about false positives. Innocent people being falsely accused of shoplifting. The difference between committing a crime and not committing a crime is not simply semantics.

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#66

Post by _c2xg »

JohnFen wrote: post #24
itslennysfault wrote: post #19

I wonder who provides them this tech. A friend of mine quit a company because they were developing a VERY similar technology a few years back. He "lovingly" called it RPaaS (Racial Profiling as a Service). He went WAAAY above his pay grade to protest against the creation of the product and it ultimately ended in him sending a letter of resignation.

Please express my admiration for your friend's actions here. We need more people like him.

So that’s why everything is expensive

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#67

Post by georgedegennaro »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #8

If the best face recognition software has an error rate of 0.08% [1] and Rite Aid serves 1.6M customers a day [2] what moron thought that was a good idea? [1] https://github.com/usnistgov/frvt/blob/nist-pages/reports/1N... [2] https://careers.riteaid.com/pages/company-info

As opposed to the alternative?

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#69

Post by georgedegennaro »

btbuildem wrote: post #4

> with “largely lower-income, non-white neighborhoods” serving as the technology testbed. There's been plenty of articles pointing out that certain demographics are very under-represented in training sets, leading to all kinds of errors [1] [2]. Technological advances aside, the company should have clearly disclosed their use of facial recognition technology - concealing that raises serious privacy issues. 1: https:/…

[flagged]

Re: Rite Aid banned from using face recognition software after false ID shoplifters

#70

Post by JohnFen »

flextheruler wrote: post #46
the_doctah wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is "hell on earth" to you? Cops have probable cause and search you. Find no evidence. "Oh boy sorry for the mix up sir". Hell on earth!

Spotted the person who has never been detained/arrested and then searched in public before. Trust me man it’s especially degrading not to mention time consuming.

And in the US, just being arrested -- even if the arrest was a mistake and no charges are filed -- has serious adverse consequences for the arrested person.
Post reply on HN