Facial Recognition Technology | Benefits and Challenges
A subcategory of biometric security is great facial technology. Voice, fingerprint, and eye retina or iris identification are further biometric software types.
Although there is growing interest in using the technology in other sectors, security and law enforcement still account for the majority of its uses.
According to its definition, facial recognition refers to any technology that may recognise or confirm a subject based on a picture, video, or other audiovisual representation of his face. This identification often functions like a face scanner and is used to access a programme, system, or service.
What is Facial Recognition Technology?
Facial recognition is a method of recognising or verifying a person’s identification using their face. People may be recognised using real-time facial recognition technology or still images and videos.
FaceID, which is used to unlock iPhones, has made facial recognition well known (however, this is only one application of face recognition).
Facial recognition typically identifies and recognises one person as the sole owner of the device, limiting access to others rather than relying on an extensive database of photos to determine an individual’s identity. Facial recognition matches the faces of persons passing by unique cameras to pictures of people on a watch list, going beyond simply unlocking phones.
The photographs on the watch lists can originate from anywhere, including our social media accounts, and they can show anyone, including those not suspected of any crime.
How does Facial Recognition Technology Work?
Although facial technology systems can differ, they typically function as follows:
Face detection
The camera can identify and locate whether a face is alone or among a group of people. The subject may be shown facing directly ahead or in profile.
Face analysis
The face is then photographed and examined after that. Most face recognition technology uses 2D rather than 3D photographs since it is easier to match a 2D image with existing data or public photos. The computer reads your face’s geometry.
The distance between your eyes, the depth of your eye sockets, the space between your forehead and chin, the form of your cheekbones, and the shape of your lips, ears, and chin are all important considerations.
Converting the image to data
Based on the subject’s facial traits, the face capture procedure converts analogue information (a face) into a collection of digital information (data). The examination of your face is reduced to a mathematical formula. The faceprint is a numerical code. Every person has their own faceprint, just like every thumbprint is different.
Finding a match
Then, a database of other recognised faces is used to compare your faceprint. The FBI, for instance, has access to up to 650 million images pulled from various state databases.
Any image tagged with a name on Facebook is added to Facebook’s database, which is also capable of face recognition. A decision is made if your faceprint matches a picture in a facial recognition database.
The most natural biometric measurement is regarded to be face recognition. This makes intuitive sense given that we usually recognise ourselves and other people by looking at their faces rather than their thumbprints or irises.
According to estimates, facial recognition frequently interacts with more than half of the world’s population.
Usage of Facial Recognition Technology
There are several uses for facial recognition technology. These consist of:
Unlocking phones
Face recognition is a feature that many phones, including the most current iPhones, employ to unlock the phone. The technology provides a solid method to secure personal information and guarantees that important information stays inaccessible if the phone is stolen.
According to Apple, the likelihood of a random face unlocking your phone is one in one million.
Legal action
Law enforcement frequently makes use of facial recognition. According to a recent NBC article, the use of technology by law enforcement organisations in the US and other nations is growing. Police gather mug pictures from suspects after an arrest and cross-reference them with national, state, and local facial recognition databases.
Once an arrestee’s photograph has been taken, it will be stored in databases and examined each time police conduct another criminal investigation. Additionally, mobile face recognition enables law enforcement officials to photograph a motorist or a pedestrian on the street using smartphones, tablets, or other portable devices and then instantly compare that image to one or more face recognition databases to make an identification attempt.
Airports, Border Security
Facial recognition is already commonplace in numerous airports all around the world. A growing percentage of travellers have biometric passports, which enable them to bypass the typically lengthy lineups and proceed directly to the gate by passing through an automated ePassport control.
Airports may increase security and reduce waiting times by using facial recognition. By 2023, 97% of travellers will be subject to face recognition, according to the US Department of Homeland Security.
The technology is used to improve security at major events like the Olympics and at airports and border crossings.
Locating the Missing
Finding missing people and victims of human trafficking can be done using facial recognition. Let’s say a database is expanded to include absent people. In that instance, whether they are in an airport, supermarket, or other public areas, law enforcement may be informed as soon as they are detected by facial recognition.
Lowering criminality in stores
When known shoplifters, organised retail criminals, or those with a history of fraud enter establishments, they can be recognised using facial recognition technology.
Loss prevention and retail security specialists can alert customers who could pose a threat enter the store by matching photographs of individuals against massive databases of offenders.
Enhancing the Shopping experience
The use of technology has the potential to enhance consumer shopping experiences. For instance, in-store kiosks might identify customers, recommend products based on their past purchases, and properly send them.
By using “face pay” technology, customers may be able to bypass lengthy checkout queues.
Banking
Face recognition also has the advantage of biometric internet banking. Customers can authorise transactions by glancing at their computer or smartphone in place of one-time passwords. There are no passwords for hackers to steal using face recognition.
In theory, “liveless” detection, which determines whether the source of a biometric sample is a live human being or a phoney representation, should stop hackers from utilising your photo database for impersonation if they manage to get their hands on it.
Debit cards and signatures could be obsolete, thanks to face recognition.
Advertisement and Marketing
Marketers have utilised facial recognition to improve customer experiences. For instance, the frozen pizza company DiGiorno employed facial recognition in a 2017 marketing campaign to scan partygoers’ facial expressions to determine how they felt about the food.
The media also use facial recognition to assess how viewers react to movie trailers, TV pilot characters, and the best times to run commercials.
Healthcare
Facial recognition is used in hospitals to aid with patient care. Healthcare organisations are experimenting with face recognition to access patient information, speed up patient registration, identify particular genetic illnesses, and even assist patients in expressing emotions and suffering. To make sure that patients take their medication as directed, AiCure has created an app that uses face recognition.
Monitoring Employee or Student Attendance
Face recognition technology is used in several Chinese educational institutions to prevent pupils from missing classes. To verify pupils’ identities, tablets scan and compare their faces to pictures in a database. More generally, employees may check in and out of their workplaces using technology, allowing employers to keep track of attendance.
Identifying Drivers
This consumer report claims that automakers are testing the use of face recognition to replace car keys. The car’s starting and entry would no longer require a key, and the system would also remember the driver’s preferred seat, mirror configurations, and radio station presets.
Keeping an eye on gambling addiction
The level of client protection gaming enterprises may increase with facial recognition. Human workers might find monitoring people entering and leaving gaming areas challenging, particularly in congested, huge venues like casinos.
Companies can detect those listed as gambling addicts thanks to facial recognition, which also records their play so that employees can suggest when it’s time to quit.
Benefits of Facial Recognition Technology
Facial recognition offers further advantages in addition to unlocking your smartphone:
More security
Governments may use facial recognition technology to track down terrorists and other criminals. Facial recognition may be used as a security technique for securing personal devices and for home security cameras on a personal level.
Decreased crime
When face recognition is used, finding burglars, thieves, and trespassers is simpler. Even just knowing that facial recognition technology is in place might reduce crime, especially minor offences. Cybersecurity has advantages in addition to physical security.
Face recognition technology may be used by businesses to access computers without passwords.
Eliminating prejudice from stop and search
Police issue stems from complaints from the public about unlawful stops and searches; face recognition technology might streamline the procedure.
Face recognition technology might assist in minimise possible prejudice and lessen stops and searches on law-abiding persons by identifying suspects among crowds using an automated procedure rather than a human one.
Increased comfort
Customers won’t need to use their credit cards or cash to purchase in stores as the technology becomes more widely used. This could shorten wait times at the register.
Facial recognition provides a rapid, automated, and seamless verification process because it doesn’t involve physical touches like fingerprinting or other security procedures – which is important in the post-COVID environment.
More rapid processing
Facial recognition provides advantages for businesses utilising it since it can identify faces in under a second. In a time of sophisticated hacking tools and cyberattacks, businesses want both safe and quick solutions. Quick and effective identification verification is made possible by facial recognition.
Including additional technologies in the mix
The majority of security software is compatible with facial recognition systems. In actuality, integration is simple. As a result, the amount of additional funding needed to implement it is constrained.
Challenges in Facial Recognition Technology
When facial recognition technology is used in situations with a clear advantage or justification, some individuals may not mind being videotaped in public and do not object to its usage.
However, technology can elicit strong emotions from others. A few of the drawbacks or issues are:
Surveillance
Some people are concerned that the widespread use of face recognition technologies, video cameras, artificial intelligence, and data analytics raises the possibility of mass monitoring, limiting personal freedom.
Governments can hunt down criminals using face recognition technology, but they could also track down regular individuals at any moment.
Margin of error
Facial recognition data can contain errors, resulting in false accusations against innocent persons. For instance, a little adjustment to the camera position or a modification to one’s look, such as a new hairdo, might result in inaccuracy.
Violation of Privacy
The most divisive issue is one of ethics and privacy. Governments have been known to store the images of a number of persons without their permission.
The European Commission said in 2020 that it was considering prohibiting face recognition technology for up to five years in public areas to develop a legal framework to stop privacy and ethical breaches.
Enormous data storage
Machine learning is the foundation of facial recognition software, and for it to “learn” and provide reliable results, it needs enormous amounts of data. Strong data storage is necessary for such huge data collection. Small and medium-sized businesses might not have the tools required to keep the necessary data.
