Privacy

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Police to be able to run face recognition searches on 50m driving licence holders | Facial recognition | The Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

7 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/9812294

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[–] Why9 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You have to renew your driver's license every 10 years. That means in the worst case scenario, the image they're using of you could be 10 years out of date.

Those images are also not detailed enough to be used for facial recognition. Sure, it could help narrow down the list of suspected people, but they're crazy if they think they'd be able to pinpoint someone based on what they looked like 5-10 years prior.

I suspect these powers are being used for something else more sinister. Immigration, for example, to clamp down on people who have licenses and are delivery drivers, or taxi drivers for example.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

It's not the kind of search where they need to be very precise; certainly not pinpoint accuracy. t's just another tool to narrow their searches that rely on other details.

And if you're a fully grown adult, not undergoing radical facial reconstruction, it seems unlikely to be that the relative distances and orientations of your eyes, nose, and mouth are going to change very much. My driver's license photo is at least a decade old and even though my face looks different on the surface due to age, changes in weight, and changes in hair color and length I'd bet my key features are still in relatively the same places.

Of course they could also be using this for more sinister purposes. No argument there.