The Rise of Facial Recognition Technology: How It’s Changing the World

Facial recognition technology does not remain a dream of a science fiction movie anymore. Whether it is the opening of smart phones or the security in the open space, this new technology is catching up fast in our daily life. However, as it is used more and more, there are a lot of questions regarding privacy, ethics and security.

Today we are going to discuss what facial recognition technology is, how it works, where it already operates, and what it will bring to the future society.

What Is Facial Recognition?

Facial recognition technology is one of the forms of biometric software, which is used to scan and store the faceprint of an individual. With such a digital map, an automated system can match the faceprint with photographs or video clips to match or prove the identity of a person.

Facial recognition does not involve physical contact or user input like the other two forms of identification, that is, fingerprints or passwords. It merely scans a face-and sometimes the victim is not even aware of it.

The process of a facial recognition system is usually step-by-step:

• Detection: The system finds a face in a picture or video frame.
• Analysis: The most important facial features are measured- the distance between the eyes, the width of the nose and the shape of a jawline.
• Conversion: These measurements are turned into a special mathematical code, or faceprint.
• Comparison: Faceprint is compared against a database of known faces.
• Identification or Verification: A match can verify the identity of someone or suspect them and put them under investigation.

New technologies in artificial intelligence and deep learning have enabled facial recognition systems to be much more accurate and faster, and thus more effective in any commercial and government uses.

In which places are facial recognition used?

Facial recognition is in wide application now, and its uses are increasing exponentially:

• Law Enforcement: Police departments employ facial recognition to find suspects in the surveillance video or compare mugshots to criminal databases.
• Facial recognition at airports and border security: The facial-recognition technology is making checking in and customs faster, as the faces of the travelers are compared to passport photos.
• Smartphones and Devices: Facial recognition has gained popularity with Apple Face ID, as one of the most secure and convenient mechanisms of unlocking devices and user verification.
• Retail and Marketing: Facial recognition has been adopted in some stores to study the demographics of the customers or identify repeat customers to provide them with a personalized experience.
• Attendance and Access Control: Facial recognition systems are being used in business and schools to track attendance and provide access to building facilities securely.

Advantages of Facial Recognition Technology

Facial recognition technology has a number of persuasive benefits:

• Ease: Facial recognition eliminates the use of cards, passwords, or PINs thus shortening and simplifying procedures such as logging in or moving in and out of security checkpoints.
• Security: It offers a new level of security that is hard to counterfeit or fake.
• Efficiency: It automates the verification of identity minimizing human error and time savings.
• Non-Intrusiveness: It does not need any physical contact making it very hygienically acceptable or in high-traffic areas.

The Problems and Moral Issues

Although this is advantageous, facial recognition technology has its major challenges:

• Privacy Concerns: It is one of the most controversial ones as individuals can be tracked and recognized against their will. This poses a big question to monitoring and the rights of individuals.
• Bias and Inaccuracy: It has been demonstrated that certain facial recognition systems have had issues with people of color, women and younger people being less accurate. This brings about false positives and discrimination.
• Data Security: The issue of storing biometric data, including faceprints, is associated with hacking and data theft.
• Legal and Regulatory Vacuums: There are no well-defined laws governing the manner of use of facial recognition as well as the maximum time the data is supposed to be retained in most parts of the world.

Face Recognition in the Future

Since facial recognition technology is still developing, its uses will also develop and so will the debate.

Other scholars think that when controlled and managed well, face recognition may become an excellent force of good. To give an example, it may assist in finding missing individuals, in preventing identity theft, or could improve the safety of the population without invading privacy.

Some say that even the possibility of wrongful use is too high, and that facial recognition systems might open the door to mass surveillance and a lack of anonymity in any given place.

In a bid to achieve some form of balance, governments, technology firms and civil society need to collaborate and come up with ethical frameworks and transparent policies. This is through the maintenance of accuracy, data security, user consent as well as restricting use to specific situations.

Conclusion

Facial recognition technology is quickly transforming how we engage with the world- opening our cell phones to going through security at the airport. Although the technology has numerous advantages concerning convenience, security, and efficiency, it is extremely dangerous to the privacy and the civil liberties of the individuals in case it is not controlled.

With society becoming more and more dependent on the biometric system, there is a need to undertake the advantages versus the disadvantages. We can embrace the potential of facial recognition in a secure and responsible manner through intelligent regulation and innovation.

Regardless of how you feel about it, the potential or the risks, it is clear that facial recognition is here to stay and it is our choice to make it how it will influence our future.