On Tuesday, Apple revealed their newest phone. The new line was anticipated by Apple users and is another cult favorite. Â But many are rightly skeptical of the “FaceID” feature.
FaceID, is a tool that would use facial recognition to identify individuals and unlock their phones for use. Unsurprisingly, this has generated some major anxiety about mass spying and privacy concerns. Retailers already have a desire for facial recognition technology. They want to monitor consumers, and without legally binding terms and Apple could use FaceID to track consumer patterns at its stores or develop and sell data to others.
That seems minor on the surface, but the ramifications could be enormous. It’s also highly possible that police would be able to more easily unlock phones without consent by simply holding an individual’s phone up to his or her face, violating the rights of the person to privacy.
But FaceID should create fear about another form of government surveillance too. And this one is a rights violation of every person on earth: mass scans to identify individuals based on face profiles. Law enforcement is rapidly increasing their use of facial recognition; one in two American adults are already enrolled in a law enforcement facial recognition network, and at least one in four police departments has the capability to run face recognition searches. This could make Apple the target for a new mass surveillance order.
While Facebook has a powerful facial recognition system, it doesn’t maintain the operating systems that control the cameras on phones, tablets, and laptops that stare at us every day. Apple’s new system completely changes that. For the first time, a company will have a facial recognition system with millions of profiles, and the hardware to scan and identify faces throughout the world.
According to Wired, this is a system already ripe for government abuse. The government could issue an order to Apple with a set of targets and instructions to scan iPhones, iPads, and Macs to search for specific targets based on FaceID, and then Apple would provide the government with those targets’ location based on the GPS data of devices’ that receive a match. Apple has a good record of fighting for user privacy, but there’s only so much the company could do if its objections to an order are turned down by the courts. And the government is already looking into how this could benefit them, but are hiding behind the guise of “privacy.” On Wednesday Sen. Al Franken (D-Minnesota) released a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, asking how the company will handle the technology’s security and privacy implications.
But this type of sleazy “Big Brother” activity by the government is not new.
Over the last decade the government has increasingly embraced this type of mass scan method. Edward Snowden’s disclosures revealed the existence of Upstream, a program under FISA Section 702 (set to expire in just a few months). With Upstream, the NSA scans all internet communications going into and out of the United States for surveillance targets’ emails, as well as IP addresses and what the agency has called cybersignatures. And last year Reuters revealed that Yahoo, in compliance with a government order, built custom software to scan hundreds of millions of email accounts for content that contained a digital signature used by surveillance targets. –Wired
Mass facial recognition scans are unconstitutional and a gross violation of human privacy rights. But that has yet to stop the overreaching government from its pursuit of an even more effective method of their goal of dystopian mass surveillance.
No worries, it will be as secure as your file in an Equifax database
No ‘could be’. IT IS.
only an idiot would buy this crap, better known as an Apple I phone
“Mass facial recognition scans are unconstitutional and a gross violation of human privacy rights.”
Constitutional?
What an ancient, outdated concept!
Mac, what are you thinking.
Stick a fork in the US. We’re done.
Apple is the “Mark of the Beast”. Stop feeding the beast. I have NEVER bought any Apple products ever and neither should you.
In Florida due to the Hurricane the Feds will give victims $250. Yup just sign up with you house address and give your full banking info. ABA# and DDA# bank account numbers so they can direct the payment. Gee what possible hacking of bank acct info could possibly go wrong there? My unprepared neighbors are all in on the idea. More reward for unprepared losers. I said to the lady so you have to give your bank acct info to the Feds eh? She says back to me, “you are such a conspiracy therorist.” I laughed and said good luck with that. They fail to prepare and like free stuff from the Government. Maybe they will put a chip in your hand and clean out your bank acct and check your deposits against your tax returns. Duh?
See you made it through the maytag ringer. How you fairin’?
LMAO! your’re right! What could go possibly wrong taking their few shekels?
He’s a one term president anyway. There is virtually no way he’d win again – many people (me) voted for him because he was the lesser of two evils. He might win again if someone like Maxine Waters ran.
Only a spy tool if YOU USE IT. Don’t use it.
The time for concern over privacy is long gone. Debates over the issue has stopped nothing. Just ask the CEO at Equifux. Oh, I meant Eqifax.
Wear a Guy Fawkes mask, walk like an Egyptian, and screw their tools.
That is why I don’t buy apple products.
Sgt.
“The more you tighten your grip the more star systems will slip through your fingers” Leia star wars
Freedom is not borne through fear. But sometimes the brave will give their lives fighting against tyranny. People who truly believe in freedom, including politicians, are probably down to about 8 percent of the population. Not scientific, just a random guess based on personal views. What do we teach our sons and daughters if this is the way the US is going?
Digital laws are practically nonexistent and therefore subject to the judges discretion. The facial recognition will be ruled in favor of the oppressors based on no real rules being in place and the whole system being corrupt. Big gov = big business = Big banks = it’s a big club and you ain’t in it.
Fascism, per its founder Mussolini, is the merger of the socialist state with co-opted, crony big business.
Please, so all I need to do is video someone and I can open their IPhone with an image of their face, and steal all their money. Then break their nose, their face swells, and they can’t even qualify for healthcare because the system doesn’t recognize their identity, and the police can’t verify their ID.
Sounds wonderful.
But they gave their word that they wouldn’t use it to spy on people. I trust them. Does anyone want to buy a bridge?
They are already spying….so who gives a shit?
Every time I look at anything, it shows up in ads when I go online. Hell, this summer I was at King Soopers looking at grills IN PERSON and when I got home the ads were all over on every site I went to. There comes a point where you just got to say, fuck it!
Ironic that pigs are already complaining that this security will inhibit them solving crimes….LMAO
You are a techidiot. Just like my father. He is such a loser and he does not use ad blockers and then complains his web searches are filled with crappy ads and porn stuff. He gets all the endless mass emails, phone calls, etc. from stores and products because they have him in their data bases. He doesn’t get it: I tell him they harvest his data and sell it and map it yet he thinks it is ‘wrong’ to block this crap because they have a right to sell junk to him. He is the worst sort of system-obeying moron.
Could be? There is no doubt. We’re doomed!
Like it or not, we need 24/7 mass facial screening in the cities. Unfortunately, we have too many people wandering around who are threats and we do not know who they or what they are doing. Facial scans would eliminate innocent people and allow the authorities to focus on the perps and scum bags. It would also address the ‘race’ issue since your face does not lie: you are either up to no good or you are not, irrespective of race or ethnicity. The Japanese have systems that can process millions of faces and matches in seconds. The technology is ready to roll. I am sure stores and public transit will go to this if only to address the legal issues and prevent law suits.
Spoken like a true big govt. system obeying moron.
You’re probably a neocon war hawk dipshit repube
Frank I’m just for shootin’ the losers. Until open season starts I’ll stay away from the ‘lime light’.
You are Big Brother’s wet dream. Such a docile little serf – here’s your complimentary bottle of Victory Gin.
Poisoned apple is more like it.
I know this is off-topic – slightly, but it still concerns id and photo-id. I am in a dispute with paypal/ebay. They want me to send photo-id of myself. Here is the problem. If they do not already have photo-id – and they shouldnt – then why do they need myself to send them photo-id of myself to prove who I am? Its not going to as they have no image to check the image I send against. As far as I can see it they are just phishing for an actual photo of myself. I could send a photo of anyone I suppose; how would they know the difference. Anyway I wont give in and do something that does not make sense according to their argument.
The police cannot unlock your phone by pointing a Face ID (two words) compatible iPhone at your face if you have “Attention Awareness” turned on in Settings. (It’s on by default). This requires that your eyes are open and looking at the iPhone in order for Face ID to work.
It’s not like the sheeple who are being spied on by creepy corporations like Google and Facebook or their shadowy “partners” care about outdated concepts like privacy or liberty.
Talk about creepy things on phones…. a while back I was checking my system data. It said there was a photo in my camera program. I never use my phone camera. I have thick tape over both lenses and closed all photo options settings, always. But there was a picture of my right hand and wrist holding my phone displaying my screen saver….just as if I had taken the picture with my own eyes. How did they do that? Used my eyes reflection as their camera? This really creeped me out! Can they do that? It was like someone taking a picture from somone elses sunglass reflection. Who would do that and why?
That is enough to make someone throw all the computer junkin the bait box and forget it all!