Smart Cameras Blog

Facial recognition funding is still ongoing despite EPIC’s disapproval.

The latest is an order from the U.S. Department of State for its biometric program (ABIS) to Indentix. Identix was selected through a competitive bidding process and detailed technical evaluation. According to Security Park‘s rehashing of the PR, Identix performed well:

In the first six months of the original terms of the contract, Identix deployed three fully operational systems in support of the Visa Office, including an ABIS system with more than 40 million enrolled images and the e-Diversity Visa system. Within the first few weeks of operation of the e-Diversity Visa system, DOS credited Identix’ ABIS with helping to identify more than 5,000 individuals attempting to enter the U.S. under fraudulent conditions.

In fact, at one site, there was a claim that Identix was able to successfully differentiate between identical twins! No idea on the veracity of this claim (or the limitations), but it is interesting. According to COTS Journal, Identix’s solution is noteworthy because it runs on everyday computers. The figure below comes from their article and illustrates how Identix’s facial recognition works.

While I share EPIC’s mistrust of facial recognition, my distrust is based on past performance and the notion that facial recognition is the “silver bullet”. Instead, I see facial recognition as useful under carefully controlled situations with oversight. It looks like its working for the Department of State, lets hope as time goes on, we can find out more about the effectiveness of this technology.

rshah Uncategorized