Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition • Hacker News Board

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#361

Post by rithdmc » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 1:29 PM UTC

tlogan wrote: post #354

rithdmc wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Appealing to authority ("The AI said it was her!") is absolutely a problem.

No. I think the core issue is that they used her 2019 booking photo (a mugshot) from a public intoxication arrest. I am not sure whether a photo like that is reliable :) In the end, the detective compared the booking photo with the camera footage and concluded they were the same person, then presented that to the judge. I also wonder what her “probation” was for. Maybe she once wrote a bad check and got into trouble,…

Yes. Appealing to authority ("The AI said it was her!") is absolutely a problem.

I'm not dismissing the rest of what you are saying, but I don't think you should dismiss appeals to authority being a factor, either.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#362

Post by rithdmc » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 1:30 PM UTC

ChoGGi wrote: post #360

rithdmc wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The concept of pre-trial detention is nuts to me. In Ireland, sensibly, you can not set bail that is insurmountable to the defendant.

She wasn't allowed bail as a fugitive.

But she wasn't a fugitive. She was wrongly identified.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#363

Post by mwigdahl » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 1:45 PM UTC

JuniperMesos wrote: post #340

antonymoose wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of a case that just popped up in my neck of the woods. Man gets pulled over on an expired plate. They search based on this fact, find a pill bottle (for Irritable Bowel Syndrome) and magically find he’s trafficking cocaine and fentanyl. Months later a lab test exonerates the poor guy. https://www.wyff4.com/article/deputies-falsely-identify-ibs-...

This one seems pretty reasonable - according to the article, the cops pulled him over for swerving lanes (driving unsafely on public roads in a reasonable thing to want to police), and then discovered that he was driving on a suspended license, which he admitted to (it's reasonable to have a system for suspending peoples' drivers licenses that is enforced by the police). The police find the pill bottle and don't beli…

If a field drug test can confuse an irritable bowel syndrome drug for fentanyl or cocaine, it is not reliable enough to be used for law enforcement purposes. The same applies to facial recognition tech. We need real information on the false positive vs false negative rates for tech that purports to establish identity or criminality.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#364

Post by PopAlongKid » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 1:55 PM UTC

throwaway17_17 wrote: post #258

deepsun wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well in most cases I would prefer to have a cop's word to outweigh a word of an average joe.

The belief by a juror that law enforcement personnel, especially phrased as a belief that applies to law enforcement personnel as a generic group, is a well established basis for a challenge for cause leading to exclusion of that person from being a juror. The US jury system is build explicitly on excluding these types of belief in juries in order to ensure fairness, impartiality, and individual and case/witness spec…

>The belief by a juror that law enforcement personnel,

>excluding these types of belief

You have not stated what belief you are talking about.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#365

Post by mapt » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 2:04 PM UTC

rglover wrote: post #86

whack wrote: post #51

> According to the court documents, the Fargo detective working the case then looked at Lipps' social media accounts and Tennessee driver's license photo. In his charging document, the detective wrote that Lipps appeared to be the suspect based on facial features, body type and hairstyle and color. > Once they were in hand, Fargo police met with him and Lipps at the Cass County jail on Dec. 19. She had already been i…

> How is this the fault of AI? It flagged a possible match. A live human detective confirmed it. Because we're seeing the first instances of what reality looks like with AI in the hands of the average bear. Just like the excuse was "but the computer said it was correct," now we're just shifting to "but the AI said it was correct." Don't underestimate how much authority and thinking people will delegate to machines. N…

If you're skeptical, watch this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPUBXN2Fd_E

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#366

Post by mapt » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 2:07 PM UTC

pixl97 wrote: post #207

lotsofpulp wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they are supposed to possess minimum levels of intelligence found in homo sapiens, which includes not believing anything a salesperson says. Also, their whole job is dealing with people who constantly lie to them.

There are two things occurring here. Police get raises and recognition for closing cases. In general they don't care if you're guilty or not, that's someone else's problem. Same with the detective, same with the DA. The more cases they close they 'tougher they are on crime'. The next thing occurring is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_says_no https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_says_no

If you have a broken system whose injustice is checked only by the limitations of the human elements, and you start replacing those human elements and powerscaling them, you have an unlimited downside.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#367

Post by FinnKuhn » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 2:16 PM UTC

Aardwolf wrote: post #14

This reminds me of the British Post Office Scandal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Post_Office_scandal

Reminded me of this video of AI software causing an innocent men to be arrested: https://thecivilrightslawyer.com/2026/03/11/ai-software-tell...

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#368

Post by mlinsey » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 2:32 PM UTC

Y-bar wrote: post #308

kitd wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You wouldn't know they had no history of leaving their local area unless you interviewed them.

Why does not the investigator have to supply some sort of evidence that she has a history of leaving their local area rather than putting the onus on the accused? This line of argument is halfway to "guilty until proven otherwise".

You and the GP that replied to me are way overstating what it means to be a "suspect". It just means the police are investigating you and consider it a possibility you've committed the crime. On its own, is not a sufficient status to search your home, subpoena your ISP, or arrest you - all of those things require a much higher burden of evidence, and oftena third party (judge's) approval. People routinely become "suspects" on much flimsier evidence than an unreliable software match - if I call in an anonymous tip that I saw you acting suspicious near the crime scene, you will probably become a suspect.

If you'd like, you can replace the term "suspect" in my post with "person of interest", which colloquially implies a lot less suspicion but isn't practically any different in terms of how the police interacts with you.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#369

Post by tptacek » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 2:40 PM UTC

mschild wrote: post #300

lotsofpulp wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they are supposed to possess minimum levels of intelligence found in homo sapiens, which includes not believing anything a salesperson says. Also, their whole job is dealing with people who constantly lie to them.

Some police departments seem to actively reject candidates that have higher scores on IQ tests. Not that I think IQ test scores and actual intelligence are related but it clearly shows their intended target candidate group. https://abcnews.com/US/court-oks-barring-high-iqs-cops/story...

This came up a few weeks ago. I don't think it's true. This lawsuit from 26 years ago is the only example anybody has come up with. Among the problems with this claim:

* Nobody can find a police department that administers any kind of general cognitive test.

* There are large states with statewide written police aptitude tests that are imperfect but correlated to general cognitive ability, and maximizing scores on that test is the universal correct strategy.

* It's a luridly stupid policy and most municipalities aren't luridly stupid.

I think this happened like, once or twice, in one or two of the 20,000 police departments across the United States, many of which are like one goober and his sidekick (no offense to them; just, you live in gooberville, you're a goober), and now it's an Internet meme that police departments specifically hire for midwittery. Nah.

Re: Innocent woman jailed after being misidentified using AI facial recognition

#370

Post by GuinansEyebrows » Fri, Mar 13, 2026, 2:57 PM UTC

vkou wrote: post #149

GuinansEyebrows wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

oh, i generally don't disagree with you on that point; i specifically meant that when presented with the question "do you want your tax dollars to pay for police liabilities?" the answer is probably almost always "no".

Sure. But when you ask "Do you want the police to be unable to do their job and live in a lawless hellscape ran by gangbangers and ISIS cartels?, the answer is also 'No.' The problem is that the mass media sets the framing of acceptable discourse, and that mass media is in large part an ideological monoculture. And even when it's not, it is happy to present absolutely insane batshit lunacy as 'one of the two sides' o…

yeah - i think the media is certainly culpable, but i also think this speaks to the power of police unions like i mentioned earlier. media is happy to present stories presented to them on silver platters by "respected" institutions because they carry all the hallmarks of legitimacy.