Washington, Oct 29 (AFP) Apple will let you unlock theiPhone X with your face -- a move likely to bring facialrecognition to the masses, along with concerns over how thetechnology may be used for nefarious purposes.
Apple's newest device, set to go on sale November 3,is designed to be unlocked with a facial scan with a number ofprivacy safeguards -- as the data will only be stored on thephone and not in any databases.
Unlocking one's phone with a face scan may offer addedconvenience and security for iPhone users, according to Apple,which claims its "neural engine" for FaceID cannot be trickedby a photo or hacker.
While other devices have offered facial recognition,Apple is the first to pack the technology allowing for athree-dimensional scan into a hand-held phone.
But despite Apple's safeguards, privacy activists fearthe widespread use of facial recognition would "normalise" thetechnology and open the door to broader use by lawenforcement, marketers or others of a largely unregulatedtool.
"Apple has done a number of things well for privacybut it's not always going to be about the iPhone X," said JayStanley, a policy analyst with the American Civil LibertiesUnion.
"There are real reasons to worry that facialrecognition will work its way into our culture and become asurveillance technology that is abused." A study last year by Georgetown University researchersfound nearly half of all Americans in a law enforcementdatabase that includes facial recognition, without theirconsent.
Civil liberties groups have sued over the FBI's use ofits "next generation" biometric database, which includesfacial profiles, claiming it has a high error rate and thepotential for tracking innocent people.
"We don't want police officers having a watch listembedded in their body cameras scanning faces on thesidewalk," said Stanley.
Clare Garvie -- the Georgetown University Law Schoolassociate who led the 2016 study on facial recognitiondatabases -- agreed that Apple is taking a responsibleapproach but others might not.
"My concern is that the public is going to becomeinured or complacent about this," Garvie said.
Widespread use of facial recognition "could make ourlives more trackable by advertisers, by law enforcement andmaybe someday by private individuals," she said.
Garvie said her research found significant errors inlaw enforcement facial recognition databases, opening up thepossibility someone could be wrongly identified as a criminalsuspect.
Another worry, she said, is that police could trackindividuals who have committed no crime simply forparticipating in demonstrations.
Shanghai and other Chinese cities have recentlystarted deploying facial recognition to catch those who floutthe rules of the road, including jaywalkers.
Facial recognition and related technologies can alsobe used by retail stores to identify potential shoplifters,and by casinos to pinpoint undesirable gamblers.
It can even be used to deliver personalized marketingmessages -- and could have some other potentially unnervingapplications.
Last year, a Russian photographer figured out how tomatch the faces of porn stars with their social media profilesto "doxx" them, or reveal their true identities.
This type of use "can create huge problems," saidGarvie. "We have to consider the worst possible uses of thetechnology." Apple's system uses 30,000 infrared dots to create adigital image which is stored in a "secure enclave," accordingto a white paper issued by the company on its security. Itsaid the chances of a "random" person being able to unlock thedevice are one in a million, compared with one in 50,000 forits TouchID.
Apple's FaceID is likely to touch off fresh legalbattles about whether police can require someone to unlock adevice.
FaceID "brings the company deeper into a legal debate"that stemmed from the introduction of fingerprintidentification on smartphones, according to ACLU staffattorney Brett Max Kaufman.
Kaufman says in a blog post that courts will begrappling with the constitutional guarantees againstunreasonable searches and self-incrimination if a suspect isforced to unlock a device.
US courts have generally ruled that it would violate auser's rights to give up a passcode because it is"testimonial" -- but that situation becomes murkier whenbiometrics are applied.
Apple appears to have anticipated this situation byallowing a user to press two buttons for two seconds torequire a passcode, but Garvie said court battles overcompelling the use of FaceID are likely.
Regardless of these concerns, Apple's introduction islikely to bring about widespread use of facial recognitiontechnology.
"What Apple is doing here will popularize and getpeople more comfortable with the technology," said PatrickMoorhead, principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, whofollows the sector.
"If I look at Apple's track record of making thingseasy for consumers, I'm optimistic users are going to likethis." Garvie added it is important to have conversationsabout facial recognition because there is little regulationgoverning the use of the technology.
"The technology may well be inevitable," she said.
"It is going to become part of everyone's lives if itisn't already." (AFP)KUN.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.
