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An artist has unveiled a clothing line designed to confuse facial recognition technology and hand privacy back to internet users.
Adam Harvey, who has created various projects relating to mass surveillance at his headquarters in Berlin, said he intends to fight back against the now widespread commercial use of facial recognition with a new textiles strategy called Hyperface.
By applying seemingly random patterns to clothing, these appear as thousands of recognisable faces during analysis and can overwhelm computer systems.
Amazon recently started using facial recognition technology at checkouts in their physical store, while Facebook and Apple also use it to tag photos for users.
Mr Harvey told the Chaos Communications Congress last year, that he was using the Hyperface project, created in partnership with Hyphen-Labs, to “overload an algorithm with what it wants, oversaturating an area with faces to divert the gaze of the computer”.
He said: “My projects are motivated by concerns about how computer vision will be used to extract knowledge with the cooperation or consent of an individual,” adding that he felt facial recognition technology “poses a significant threat to privacy”.
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PA
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Ye et al/Current Biology
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Reuters
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A. Gennari
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Steven G Johnson
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Clay Bolt
Science news in pictures New mammal species found inside crocodile Fossilised bones digested by crocodiles have revealed the existence of three new mammal species that roamed the Cayman Islands 300 years ago. The bones belonged to two large rodent species and a small shrew-like animal
New Mexico Museum of Natural History
Science news in pictures Fabric that changes according to temperature created Scientists at the University of Maryland have created a fabric that adapts to heat, expanding to allow more heat to escape the body when warm and compacting to retain more heat when cold
Faye Levine, University of Maryland
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Getty/AFP
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Reuters/AP
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Viktor Radermacher / SWNS
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ESO/A. Müller et al
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José Iriarte
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Science news in pictures Nasa releases stunning images of Jupiter's great red spot The storm bigger than the Earth, has been swhirling for 350 years. The image's colours have been enhanced after it was sent back to Earth.
Pictures by: Tom Momary
Mr Harvey has already introduced CV Dazzle - an avant-garde form of makeup and hairstyling which could be used to confuse facial recognition. He views Hyperface as an extension of this earlier project.
He also designed Stealth Wear, a collection of counter surveillance clothes which he said helped wearers hide from thermal imaging and drones.
In December, a Russian company launched a controversial programme called FindFace that can identify a stranger among 300 million Twitter users in less than a second, despite a warning that the app violated the website's rules.
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