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

Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 93 posts

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#41

Post by klodolph »

coverup wrote: post #7
thomasfl wrote: post #2

This small radard is sensitive enough to identify playing cards by looking at the tiny texture. Looking forward to seeing magicians using this in card tricks. Face ID with hyper sensitive radard should also be very accurate.

Richard Turner, self-styled card mechanic, can count and manipulate cards with unbelievable precision by feel alone. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwFIJyWKs1k He also happens to be blind.

I'm not sure "self-styled" is quite right here, he is a card mechanic, that's the term for someone who cheats at card games by manipulating cards, and he demonstrates exactly those techniques.

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#42

Post by coverup »

klodolph wrote: post #41
coverup wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Richard Turner, self-styled card mechanic, can count and manipulate cards with unbelievable precision by feel alone. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwFIJyWKs1k He also happens to be blind.

I'm not sure "self-styled" is quite right here, he is a card mechanic, that's the term for someone who cheats at card games by manipulating cards, and he demonstrates exactly those techniques.

Ah, thanks. I didn't know that was a common term.

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#44

Post by Digit-Al »

andrewstellman wrote: post #35

> And unlike with object recognition that uses cameras, there are no privacy concerns, or need to maintain line-of-sight or good lighting conditions. Radar works through different materials and in the dark as well as the light. Wait, what? The ability to see through walls and not require line of sight leads to fewer privacy concerns? Seems to me the privacy concerns are significantly greater for radar than facial rec…

Firstly, I think (though I could be wrong) that when they talk about privacy concerns they mean the sort of concerns the average person would have about having a camera about... I.e. naked or compromising pictures of themselves getting leaked. I would guess this wouldn't be a problem with radar as it doesn't create images.

Out of curiosity though, not having much knowledge on the subject myself, what would be your security concerns? I would be genuinely interested in knowing what we should be looking out for, privacy wise, with such technology.

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#47

Post by crawfordcomeaux »

Digit-Al wrote: post #44
andrewstellman wrote: post #35

> And unlike with object recognition that uses cameras, there are no privacy concerns, or need to maintain line-of-sight or good lighting conditions. Radar works through different materials and in the dark as well as the light. Wait, what? The ability to see through walls and not require line of sight leads to fewer privacy concerns? Seems to me the privacy concerns are significantly greater for radar than facial rec…

Firstly, I think (though I could be wrong) that when they talk about privacy concerns they mean the sort of concerns the average person would have about having a camera about... I.e. naked or compromising pictures of themselves getting leaked. I would guess this wouldn't be a problem with radar as it doesn't create images. Out of curiosity though, not having much knowledge on the subject myself, what would be your se…

Emotional manipulation. Using radar to detect emotional states with 70% accuracy for the general public was achieved 2 years ago by the EQ Radio team at MIT.

They did this by detecting breathing & heart rate at a level of accuracy on par with wired sensors.

This tech works through walls for multiple people at a time, whether they're sitting still or moving.

The world is not emotionally responsible enough to protect against this tech.

http://eqradio.csail.mit.edu

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#48

Post by mhh__ »

Hupriene wrote: post #36
andrewstellman wrote: post #35

> And unlike with object recognition that uses cameras, there are no privacy concerns, or need to maintain line-of-sight or good lighting conditions. Radar works through different materials and in the dark as well as the light. Wait, what? The ability to see through walls and not require line of sight leads to fewer privacy concerns? Seems to me the privacy concerns are significantly greater for radar than facial rec…

Yeah, I know I'm not super excited about google gaining the ability to continuously monitor the status of my erectile tissue.

Useful in a "Hang the DJ" (Black Mirror) type situation maybe...

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#49

Post by bglusman »

I'm wondering about applications of this to robotics? Like, could this replace any of the needs/uses for force-feedback sensors in robotics, and/or for all the cool stuff Dexter[1] is doing to precisely locate it's arm in space with solutions less coupled to the hardware specifics/manufacturing? Could also maybe be really cool way to train robots on really precise behaviors if they can copy with really fine precision exactly what someone does with their hands and fingers, maybe can generalize/learn from a few simple demonstrations really complex interactions if the 3d fidelity is good enough? Dunno, definitely lots of other concerns/questions but robotics and VR/AR stuff come to mind for me and weren't mentioned at all in the article or any of the other comments, curious if any reasons I'm missing why not relevant there.

[1]http://hdrobotic.com/dexter/

Re: Google’s Project Soli radar is sensitive enough to count sheets of paper

#50

Post by mediocrejoker »

dcroley wrote: post #43

If a sheet of paper is roughly .1 mm, then this must be running over 300GHz, or what is more commonly called infrared light, no?

I think it runs around 60Ghz and uses phased arrays / doppler to make up the rest of the resolution.
Post reply on HN