By banning facial recognition, we miss the point.

The essence of modern surveillance is to distinguish people to treat each one differently. Facial recognition technology is just a small part of a total surveillance system.

The author of the essay is Bruce Schneier, an American cryptographer, writer, and information security specialist. He is a member of the board of the International Association for Cryptologic Research and a member of the advisory board of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. The essay was published on January 20, 2020, on the author's blog and in the newspaper The New York Times.

Concerned citizens' groups across the United States are beginning to ban facial recognition technologies. Last May, it was banned in San Francisco, soon followed by neighboring Oakland, as well as Somerville and Brooklyn in Massachusetts (the ban may be extended to the entire state). In December, San Diego suspended its facial recognition program in anticipation of a new law coming into effect. Forty of the largest music festivals have promised not to use this technology, and activists are calling for a national ban. Many Democratic presidential candidates support at least a partial ban on facial recognition.

These efforts are driven by good intentions, but a ban on facial recognition is the wrong response to the problem of modern surveillance. Focusing on one specific method of identification distracts from the nature of the surveillance society we are building, where pervasive mass surveillance becomes the norm. In countries like China, the government is creating a total surveillance infrastructure to control society. In countries like the United States, it is being created by corporations to influence consumer behavior, and is also used by the government.

In all cases, modern mass surveillance has three primary components:

• identification;
• correlation;
• discrimination.

Let's consider them one by one.

Facial recognition is a technology that can be used to identify individuals without their knowledge or consent. It relies on the prevalence of surveillance cameras, which are becoming more powerful and compact, and machine learning technology that can match recorded footage with images from databases of existing photos.

However, this is just one of many identification methods. People can be identified from a distance by heartbeat or gait, using a laser system. The cameras are so good that they can read fingerprints and the iris of the eye from several meters away. And even without all these technologies, we can always be identified because our smartphones broadcast unique MAC addresses. We are identified by phone numbers, credit card numbers, and vehicle registrations. For example, China uses several identification methods for its total surveillance system. Once we are identified, data about our identity and actions can be linked with other data collected at different times. This can include movement data to 'track' a person throughout the day, or data on purchases, pages viewed online, and who we communicate with via email or chats. It can encompass data about our income, ethnicity, lifestyle, profession, and interests. There is a whole industry of data brokers who make a living by analyzing and.

supplementing data about who we are—using observational data collected by various companies that are sold to brokers without our knowledge or consent. In the United States, there is a vast—and almost entirely unregulated—industry of data brokers that trade our personal information. This is how large internet companies like Google and Facebook make money. It’s not just about identification. The main issue is that they can create deep profiles of individuals, collecting information about us and our interests and maximizing those profiles. That’s why many companies

purchase license plate data from state authorities. This is why companies like Google buy medical records, and partly why Google acquired Fitbit. купила Fitbit along with all its data.

The entire purpose of this process is for companies — and governments — to differentiate people and treat them differently. People are shown different ads online and offered various rates on credit cards. Smart billboards display different advertisements based on your profile. In the future, we may be automatically recognized upon entering a store just like we are when visiting a website.

It doesn't matter which technology is used for identifying people. The fact that there is currently no comprehensive database of heartbeats or walking patterns does not make data collection technologies any less effective. And in most cases, it doesn't matter if the ID is linked to a real name. What is important is that we can be consistently identified over a long period. We can be completely anonymous in a system that assigns each user a unique cookie file and tracks their online activities, but this does not interfere with similar correlation and discrimination processes. The same goes for faces. Our movements within a store or shopping mall can be tracked even without being tied to a specific name. And this anonymity is fragile: once we make a purchase using a credit card, suddenly our real names are attached to what was an anonymous tracking profile.

To regulate this system, all three stages of the surveillance process need to be taken into account. A ban on facial recognition is irrelevant if surveillance systems switch to identifying people using smartphone MAC addresses. The problem is that we are being identified without our knowledge or consent, and society requires rules on when this is permissible and when it is not.

Точно так же нам нужны правила, как наши данные можно объединять с другими данными, а затем покупать и продавать без нашего ведома или согласия. Индустрия брокеров данных почти полностью нерегулируема; есть только один закон — принятый в Вермонте в 2018 году — который требует, чтобы брокеры данных регистрировались и объясняли в общих чертах, какие данные они собирают. Крупные компании по слежке в интернете, такие как Facebook и Google, собирают на нас более подробные досье, чем были у спецслужб любого полицейского государства 20 века. Разумные законы помогут предотвратить худшие из их злоупотреблений.

Наконец, нам нужны более чёткие правила, когда и как компании могут проводить дискриминацию. Дискриминация, основанная на таких защищаемых признаках, как раса и пол, уже является незаконной, но эти правила неэффективны против современных технологий наблюдения и контроля. Когда людей можно идентифицировать и сопоставлять их данные с невиданной ранее скоростью и масштабом, нам нужны новые правила.

Сегодня системы распознавания лиц приняли на себя основной удар критики, но запрещая их, мы упускаем суть. Нужно серьёзно поговорить обо всех технологиях идентификации, корреляции и дискриминации. Мы как общество должны решить, допустим ли такой шпионаж со стороны правительства и корпораций — и как мы хотим, чтобы они влияли на нашу жизнь.

Source: habr.com