If you build a system you can query for any face and get the identity, it will not take very long for someone asking for it to be used to identify violent criminals. Then terrorists at airport gates. Then demonstrators. etc.
> wished to do what you described then this app wouldn't be the proverbial gateway drug to that point.
It's not about "gateway drug" - it's about taking small, incremental steps to get from point A to point B such that you don't realize it, and each action is a small change from the previous. This is widely known as Salami Slicing[0], though I like to call it "slow boiling a frog."
This is the same tactic I use to slowly bring errant teams and projects up-to-code at work, start off slow with a build server, add in pass-fail rules, add in style rules, add in test requirements, add in code review to ensure these things are up to snuff and before you know it we have a nice compliant project, whereas if I walked in on Day 0 and laid down the law there is guaranteed revolt.
Yes, it is a new, small, incremental step!
This is introducing a new procedure, a procedure they can change later to move the needle forward.
This is the whole point, doing small incremental steps. Each of which appears rather banal and unobjectionable.
That you don't care is proof it works!
An incremental step requires an increment. Nothing gets incremented here. The French government already had this data, and already used it to biometrically identify people. The only thing this inches toward is to a reduction in the number of public functionaries. This is the automated checkout system for State services, nothing more.
People's expectations and willingnesses are moved forward. Overton Window.
> This is the automated checkout system for State services, nothing more.
Look beyond the superficial, at larger issues.
Anyone can shoot any idea down by reducing it to a simple, innocuous sounding concept to make the other look ridiculous.
Claiming "there's nothing here" is wrong, saying "I recognize the potential for bad, but choose to accept that risk" is a different story.
Just as anyone can argue that any change to process is salami slicing even when nothing of any real value is being incremented.
I do understand your concern and I think healthy skepticism is a good thing. I’m just not convinced your so arguments are consistent with the facts being presented.
No, they aren't.
> Look beyond the superficial, at larger issues.
I'm looking at the larger issues. I just disagree with you. I don't think you have made your case.
Violent criminals and demonstrators are rarely identified through their passports because these events don't make it easy to check people's passports, but ID documents are sometimes used, the photo is just checked by policemen rather than an app on the user's phone.
True, but you can't. Facebook can't. That's (one of the reasons) they suggest tagging amongst your friends, not amongst all of FB people.
You can identify one person (with a certain degree of certainty) against a certain range of candidates.
Or you can search for one person on a small sample of images (100s or 1000s of images).
So yes you can have a db of "persons of interest" and that will be searchable when someone appears at an airport. But if the number of people in that DB increases you're going to have more false positives and lower confidence.
But they be better than face recognition at "search at a DB" tasks (especially if you have multiple fingers)
So the question is: how good at this is a facial recognition system compared to a human being?
I've been checked at airports before and I have no problem with airport security either. Terrorism or crime are real threats and police without technology is just as biased if not more so then machine aided ones.
The minority report fears every time technology is introduced to policing is an abstract and slightly silly complaint given that most police brutality and abuse of power occurs in impoverished, low tech areas, where if anything police has fewer tools and force available than in public airports and surveilled neighbourhoods.
edit: I understand that in this particular example the data is stored only on the phones, so your face is used only used to generate a unique signature, which I don't find that bad. But it's important that this is kept in check and that the system is not extended later to centralise all this data.
they also take power away from arbitrary police action because cameras work both ways. Surveillance doesn't just discipline citizens, it also disciplines authorities. If you're in a room alone with a police officer, do you prefer the cameras to be on or off?
Automated systems can have bias just like people, but at least with a digital system the data is catalogued, we can reason about why they make the decisions they make and document abuse and fix them accordingly. Try fixing corrupt police in a small town without papertrails.
That the Soviet Union was so good at oppressing people without any automated surveillance actually proves the point. Oppressive systems function just fine with people all the way down.
The narrative of surveillance as just a tool for oppression is one-sided. Citizens would be wise to use this point in time when the laws are still being drawn to use it as a tool to hold authority accountable.
As already explained the data come from passports. All of the data in passports (and ID cards since this is in France), including pictures, is already centralised in a government database. After all you gave the picture to the government when you applied for a passport...
This is also why this new system is completely neutral.
That it is neutral today does not mean it will remain so.
This chilling effect is the exact purpose, the true goal. When every terrorist and criminal can be instantly, systematically caught in the all-encompassing web of a total police state, then so can anybody else. And that means you always have to watch what you say, weigh the consequences of protest, think twice about associating with fringe ideas or people.
Terrorists are a conveniently indefensible target, but the measures against them are nonetheless a threat toward everybody else. This Can Happen To You Too. But it's okay, you have nothing to fear, just avoid being classed as a dissident. Shut up, keep your head down, and toe the line.
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me
Martin Niemoller (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_...)
This is more difficult than it may sound. Guilt by association is alive and well in most governments, and you don't always get to choose who you are associated with.