How does our face say without even speaking? Answer lies in the technology.
Facial Recognition (FR) is one of the upcoming technologies. It basically recognizes faces from a digital image. It gained popularity after Apple launched iPhone X with the face unlock feature. Since then most of the smart phones have the feature.
FR’s most use cases is in surveillance, marketing and healthcare. China alone has around 200 million cameras. Monitoring has both pros and cons. Chinese government has been peeking into the private life of the people. Simultaneously, surveillance along with FR has helped in detecting people affected with COVID-19 in China. Recently, GOI* has used FR to detect the rioters. Marketing was the least anticipated area to be affected by the FR technology. It has a broad scope now. Walgreen has launched screen coolers last year, which display ads based on your facial expression. Fashion retailer, Ruti has been using FR to enhance customer engagement and sales in New York. Expedia has smartly used FR for Hawaii bound passenger so as to personalize their experience. Alibaba, the Chinese Tech Giant has been using FR for payment solution. By the mid of this decade, don’t be surprised if the Hotel Operators greet you by name and organize the room as per your taste. Lastly, in healthcare Face2Gene is a mobile application which is used by clinics to detect rare genetic condition. Smart mirrors are being developed which can tell you whether you are healthy or not?
Apart from the above uses, FR is used for e-attendances and widely by the law agencies to detect shoplifters, criminals and terror attacks. Most of the busiest airports of the world are now using FR as it helps to save time and paper too.
The way a coin has two sides. FR too has both the positives and the negatives. The algorithms currently being used are 20 times better than the ones of late 2013. The drastic improvement doesn’t mean the scope of improvement has decreased. FR still lacks accuracy. There is inherent bias in some the algorithms currently being used. False negatives** are very severe especially for the use cases related to healthcare. Privacy is major concern, many of the US states has prohibited the use of FR without notifying the participant. Recently, Washington state banned the use of FR for the local and state governments without prior approvals from courts. There can be leak of data and further it can be misused.
Be careful someone may be observing from the door next to you and can know mood through your appearance ;)
*GOI: Government of India
**False negatives: a test result which wrongly indicates that a particular condition or attribute is absent.
Disclaimer: The image has been taken from here