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Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

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Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#411

Post by dkiebd »

y-curious wrote: post #408
dkiebd wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't know how it is in the states but in most places in Europe using violence against a violent person is likely to end up very badly for you, even if you are a guard and have the necessary permits and training. You are not going to risk being fined or jailed to stop some criminal from shoplifting from a store that is not even yours.

What is the role of a security guard if not to wield violence? Their equipment implies a capability for violence. Are they unable to perform their job legally in Europe?

If you want to risk hurting someone whilst restraining him… Otherwise, it’s not worth it. What equipment are you talking about anyway, the nightstick? In my language it is formally called the “defensa”, implying that it can’t be used to attack someone.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#412

Post by mixmastamyk »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #60
mixmastamyk wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not our first rodeo. Post 2010 we ask for evidence data collection is not happening, and not being sold for $$$.

You can't prove something is not happening, nor even provide evidence. So that would be a quite unreasonable standard if that truly is what you think we should enact.

A forensic study… audit of the source code, firewall logs, and device storage would be enough information to determine if it is happening or not.

Absolute proof it could never happen? No, but we don’t need that.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#413

Post by mystraline »

fyrabanks wrote: post #402
respondo2134 wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

self-checkout at a grocery store is so maddening. There are enough edge cases (discounted items, multiples, lack of barcodes, special deals) to make it painful if you have anything more than a few staples. And I'm sure it's also part of the disgusting push to barcode & box produce which is a negative for everyone but the suppliers & stores. >> IMO, if you want to have self-checkout, you need to accept a higher rate o…

I was at a Whole Foods last year and was tired from driving for about 6hrs straight. I scanned one item, set up a paper bag on the right, and then mindlessly bagged every other item in my cart without scanning. I paid probably $3-4 on a $60 purchase. As soon as I got to the hotel and figured it out, I went back to correct the mistake--but imagine getting harassed or taken to the back for a careless error? I'm sure th…

Depending on jurisdiction, they record everything and do nothing until you pass a felony amount. Then, they respond.

Target is well known in doing exactly this. A lot of shoplifters stay away from target past a 1 time hit.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#414

Post by dghlsakjg »

bee_rider wrote: post #381
khuey wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We should compare it against the actual alternative of stores bottlenecked by clerks that can only serve one customer at a time (or at least stores small enough that a clerk can watch everybody doing their self-service). The modern version of an old time "full service" store is an e-commerce warehouse in an exurb with quick delivery and that actually works just fine for a lot of things. It's a big component of why…

Good point. It might be worth thinking about how these costs are accounted for. In the case of the big store, loss is taken by the store (of course they pass that along as higher prices, but it is ultimately the store’s problem). For deliveries, a good chunk of easy theft (stealing off your porch) is the customer’s problem usually. There’s some unfortunate socioeconomic crosstab there, I think: if you live in a nice…

Amazon still does lockers and other collection points.

There is a whole business model built around being a package receiver for folks who don't want deliveries left on their doorstep. Most private PO box companies will receive packages for you, and there are apps that allow any business with a physical location to act as a package receiver for a fee per delivery. Often it is more convenient than residential delivery since you won't get delivery drivers falsely claiming they attempted delivery. When I used to travel a lot, I had a service that would receive mail and packages, and hold them until I was back in town. I think it was ~$10 month and well worth it.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#415

Post by dghlsakjg »

dkiebd wrote: post #382
bitwize wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New Zealand had about 5 million people, and PM Ardern successfully implemented a total lockdown that drove new COVID cases to effectively zero. Then she was voted out, and per Aurynn Shaw the plague ships were let back in. It can be done. It just requires leadership, discipline, and the willingness to take strict, decisive, politically unpopular measures against violators and spreaders of misinformation. As Schwarzen…

What it requires is authoritarianism. It requires to do things that are wildly unpopular. I'm happy every time wildly unpopular things fail. It does not matter to me that those who want to implement authoritarianism think they are right. Even if they are, we have to have agency.

Equality among races was wildly unpopular across the entire western hemisphere for a while there.

Forcing business owners to allow people of all races into your business was both unpopular and cited as an example of authoritarianism.

An American example: MLK never had popular support during his life. His approval rating around the time of his assassination was in the 30s or so. It would not be unfair to say that in the places that mattered most, he was wildly unpopular.

Doing the right thing is frequently unpopular at the time that you do it. There is a balance, but if you give everyone agency, you have to figure out how to keep the assholes from using their agency to infringe on another's agency.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#416

Post by d-us-vb »

nilamo wrote: post #274
ryukoposting wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have yet to encounter a self-checkout system competent enough to actually speed up the experience.

They're certainly faster than standing in line for 20 minutes for the only open register, tho.

the silent argument is that the store should have more open registers.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#417

Post by fluoridation »

DaSHacka wrote: post #394
fluoridation wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This subthread is not about the use of such a technology, but about Home Depot tracking a customer to build a prosecution case over time. So, no, they're not using it to prevent theft, they're using it to punish theft they've allowed.

Potato, potato. Why should the company prosecuting the thieves be anyone else's problem?

Sorry, not sure what you're getting at.

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#418

Post by bluefirebrand »

jolmg wrote: post #235
Frost1x wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, where’s the theft of my time and labor for now performing part of your business transaction process you should be performing by hiring staff to check me out. You don’t want to pay people to do that and put yourself in a higher theft situation, then you haggle the customer even more by treating them like a criminal. I had one of these happen at a self checkout the other day where the system did object tracking an…

> Yea, where’s the theft of my time and labor for now performing part of your business transaction process you should be performing by hiring staff to check me out. I've seen this sentiment in recent years, but with respect to time, self-checkout was always faster than human cashiers. You didn't need to wait while the cashiers did procedures like counting the money in the drawer and waiting for a supervisor to sign-o…

> That's unless, in your part of the world, they let you use the self-checkout with huge quantities of groceries that need bagging. In my experience, there's (always?) a limit on the number of items for self-checkout.

Where I am there is a limit that many people ignore and I have almost never seen any employee try to enforce

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#419

Post by nomdep »

rob74 wrote: post #297
bee_rider wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus, like everybody in retail, LP’s measured performance indicator is how busy they look when management is around. The best way to do that without getting in a fight is to annoy people who don’t actually have anything to hide.

That can be seen at many levels of society. ICE also prefers to round up harmless immigrants that show up for court hearings, work in fields, wait at bus stations or deliver their children to day care rather than the "dangerous criminals" that they keep on boasting about. And since every illegal immigrant is already a criminal in their view anyway, why bother?

> And since every illegal immigrant is already a criminal...

Not to be pedantic, but by definition it is, isn’t it?

Re: Home Depot sued for 'secretly' using facial recognition at self-checkouts

#420

Post by adamrezich »

MisterTea wrote: post #269
neilv wrote: post #76

I'm pretty sick of misguided/enthusiastic Loss Prevention people, and these digital systems amplify their hijinks. The most conspicuous one recently was at one upscale grocery chain within the last year. There was what I took to be a dedicated LP person who seemed to be lurking behind the self-checkouts, to watch me specifically, and I stood there until he went away. Then, as I was checking out, this employee came up…

> yet bearded street person with big trash bag full of product makes them think of lovable Santa? They do not want to confront trash bag man for good reason. What happened is people who don't give a fuck and have no problem with using violence realized there's nothing stopping them from loading up bags of goods and walking out of the store. "Oh you want to stop me? just try mother fucker." Even so called security gua…

Maybe there was something to the high-trust society we once had.

Perhaps it had something going for it that we lost when we decided to forsake it.

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