
Facebook is building brain-computer interfaces for typing and skin-hearing - pearlsteinj
https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/19/facebook-brain-interface/
======
ruddct
An advertising company wants mainline access to my brain and vital signs. What
could go wrong?

(Note: You know you're getting old when you start to get concerned about the
privacy of these things. If you'd told me when I started in tech that people
would be voluntarily buying always-on microphones sold by advertising
companies and putting them in their houses, I would've called you insane. Who
knows, maybe this will work).

~~~
colmvp
I look forward to the day when we start having to develop the Ghostery for
preventing ads that track our identity via facial/gait recognition, and the
brain and skin.

~~~
kakarot
Why Ghostery? There are addons now that provide better functionality without
the awful redesigned interface.

------
mebassett
What is unclear (at least to me) is how much of this tech actually exists, and
how much FB is simply stating their aspirations.

There is such optimism in tech that we take claims like being able to "type at
100 words per minute" without invasive surgery at face value. And there is
such cynicism that we are (or at least I am) terrified of the sort of society
this would create. But can anyone actively researching this field comment on
how feasible this is _with invasive surgery_ , never mind without?

~~~
yoz-y
I have been working in BCI for 6 years and to me this is a total moonshot (the
writing part). There is currently no affordable technology that can scan the
brain at the necessary temporal and spatial resolution to even approach the
precision of implants. The main problem is that bones and cerebrospinal fluid
dilute the currents a lot. I suppose they want to make something like wearable
IRM but that is impossible with our current tech. State of the art typing BCIs
have speeds in letters per minute. What we need is a breakthrough in sensor
technology, if Facebook can manage that then the field will be able to make a
huge leap.

~~~
wyattpeak
If you read through the article they don't seem to be talking about BCIs at
all, just a camera that reads subvocalisations. I'm surprised they can be
detected visually, but once you do that it's functionally audio processing.

Not to underplay the significance if it works, it'd be an enormous achievement
if they could get it working outside of lab conditions, but a BCI it is not.

~~~
yoz-y
In article they mention to use brain imaging to detect the speech patterns in
the brain. I have limited knowledge of subvocalisation but would not that be
detected on the throat? There were experiments with implants using phoneme
detection and they worked but that gives you only vowels. I will post the
article if I can find it.

------
daenz
“This isn’t about decoding random thoughts. This is about decoding the words
you’ve already decided to share by sending them to the speech center of your
brain.”

Somehow this still doesn't make me feel at ease.

~~~
diminoten
A future skill may be not thinking verbally.

~~~
isomorph
When I was younger I used to try not to subvocalise (?) my computer passwords,
thinking that might stop someone reading my mind. Might start that again

~~~
someguy101010
Nasa had an article[0] back in 2004 where they could detect what you were
saying with sub vocalization on the skin and were already working on
technology to read it through cloths back then, so not to get too tinfoil hat
but that might not be all that bad of an idea.

[0][https://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2004/mar/HQ_04093_subvocal_...](https://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2004/mar/HQ_04093_subvocal_speech.html)

------
sharkweek
I deal with OCD of the intrusive thought variety. Sometimes my brain gets
stuck in a loop of my deepest fears coming true. In fact, sometimes just a
single "trigger" word will get stuck repeating itself over and over in my
head.

The idea of having a brain-computer interface recording this activity is an
absolute non-starter for me.

But then again, maybe this would all normalize some of my own mental activity,
if it was more public how strange everyone's minds can act at times.

~~~
MarkPNeyer
Here's s technique I've found helpful for intrusive thoughts. It's like stack
overflowing your imagination with a vivid internal ritual, which overwrites
all the frames containing unpleasant thoughts.

I imagine writing the details of the unpleasant thought or image down in vim.
This converts the thought to "something I am observing" vs "something i and
xperiencing."

Then the ritual plays out, where inmagine the same sequence of events: saving
the file in vim to disk. Copying the file to a USB memory stic. Putting that
stick into a ziploc back. Putting that bag into a specific pocket in my
backpack. Getting my backpack and getting on my bike. Biking from my old
apartment (where I lived when I developed this technique) and bike down 101 to
moffet Air Force base, where I throw the backpack into a conveyor chute to a
rock, which launches the backpack into space.

Sometimes I had to repeat the ritual a few times, but afterward, the image or
thought recedes in intensity.

~~~
DonHopkins
You should consider using emacs instead of vim, because it can easily handle
saving the file to disk, copying it to a USB memory stick, putting it into a
ziploc bag, biking it down 101 to Moffet, throwing it onto a conveyer belt
into a rocket, and launching it into space, all automatically, in one single
keystroke!

------
snickerbockers
If there's one company I won't let into my brain, it's Facebook.

~~~
Chaebixi
But they're changing* the world!

* for some negative value of "change"

------
jasonkostempski
I had the idea of using skin as input for sound and light a long time ago as a
kid. I've since seen something using the tongue but not much else. It'll be
interesting to see what comes out of it. How many nerve endings are connected
to the brain through eyes and ears vs skin (and what the heck is 2 m2 supposed
to mean)?

As for the brain interface, outside of helping people with severe
disabilities, no thank you.

~~~
daleco
I worked on vibrotactile and electrotactile technologies (Mostly on the
tongue, belly or chest...) for years. The most sensitive part of your body is
the tongue, that's where you would get the best resolution. You could turn a
b/w images, process it and lower the resolution, then turn the white into
levels of stimulation. Unfortunately, the resolution on the tongue display is
20x20. It has its limitation, in a controlled environment we trained people to
read 4-5 letter words in few seconds or distinguish shapes. For spatial
orientation, it's better to use systems similar to a lidar and use a tactile
vest to inform the user how close is the collision.

The best use of these systems were for training formula 1 drivers (clue for
shifting, braking, timing...), force feedbacks for telesurgery or restauring
proprioception for exoskeleton users.

[https://www.ihmc.us/research/multi-sensory-multi-modal-
neura...](https://www.ihmc.us/research/multi-sensory-multi-modal-neural-
interfaces/)

[https://www.sages.org/meetings/annual-meeting/abstracts-
arch...](https://www.sages.org/meetings/annual-meeting/abstracts-archive/an-
anthro-centric-multisensory-interface-for-sensory-augmentation-of-tele-
surgery/)

[http://downloads.hindawi.com/journals/jr/2011/284352.pdf](http://downloads.hindawi.com/journals/jr/2011/284352.pdf)

------
cs702
I checked the date, but nope, it's not April Fool's today.

So apparently, yes, FaceBook is working on devices that will allow you to type
with your brain.

In return, FaceBook will need from you only access to your thoughts, and maybe
your moods and emotions too?

Rest assured, advertisers will happily pay for them.

~~~
lordCarbonFiber
The ability to use BCI != ability to access your thoughts. The technology
doesn't, and probably won't for a long while yet, for the latter to start
with. Facebook already has access to active user's thoughts, moods, and
emotions anyway; they share them willingly and in a much more machine friendly
fashion than brain waves.

Brain enabled typing is going to be the future of hands free devices, and
you're better off trying to beat them to market than lamenting the "evil
facebook boogieman".

~~~
cs702
Ah yes, except that (1) people who use such an interface will meld with it,
and (2) we're talking about brain sensors on you.

~~~
lordCarbonFiber
Most input sensors are "brain sensors" in the most reductive sense.

There's nothing spooky about brain sensors. You can buy them today, as
meditation tools. I have a long running personal project thread to to use mine
as a typing interface. It's 100% possible with current technology and not in
the least bit dystopian. Interested parties can read your thoughts much more
reliably by just parsing these public posts than trying to build a model to
get something more specific than "discrete input A" out of brain waves.

------
deepnotderp
Brb, investing in tinfoil hat stocks....

On a serious note though, what's to stop Facebook from collecting more
information than it claims? It may claim to only be scanning for verbal
locomotion, but how can we be guaranteed that they aren't discretely
monitoring our reactions to advertisements or whatnot?

~~~
notfried
When the time comes, it will be written there in the Terms & Conditions that
they can record your reactions to advertisements and more, and billions will
be clicking "I Agree."

------
jmagaro88
Time for occlumency training...

------
gremlinsinc
The next great frontier for hacking could be hacking brainwaves to get data as
you think it--that's pretty scary.

------
sizzle
I fear where we are headed with AR and BCI funded by corporations.

Check out the future portrayed by Keiichi Matsuda in HYPER-REALITY:
[https://vimeo.com/166807261](https://vimeo.com/166807261)

------
nojvek
If this works it would make torture useless right? Force implant this on
someone's head. Ask a question, usually people answer it in their own head,
realize they shouldn't say it and say that they don't know.

With Facebook's and Google's track record of privacy this seems like a weapon
NSA will have a dancing field day. The ability to hear everyone's thoughts,
it's the super power every dictator wants.

What next: ability to implant new thoughts and memory. An ad so fucking
powerful you can't resist.

------
mifeng
I think for this to work, the service would need to train for a long time on
each individual person, because our brain waves are different. In other words,
my brain waves when I mentally think of the word "cat" are totally different
from yours when you think of the word "cat."

Rather than "unsettling" (the word the article's author used), I think this
would be awesome. I hate being bounded by the speed of my clumsy, ham-handed
typing.

------
brilliantcode
This would be very interesting to see from a security stand point of view. We
are introducing another attack vector. ex. Imagine if you could phish
someone's brain.

~~~
keyme
You'd have to train yourself to "think privately" now... Most people don't
even know how to text privately. This may truly be a dystopian nightmare.

~~~
tgragnato
This is already a dystopian nightmare ...

 _Technology is pervasive_

Smartphones are the most used technological objects (everywhere, always,
repeatedly, compulsively, in the subway, on a bus, in a queue, by car, in a
restaurant, in a break). VR is massive, augmented reality is not (think about
Google Glass): it seems that this sector has picked up the witness by reaching
in no time extraordinary results and a public success that increased reality
has completely missed. It will be that we are tired of the often difficult and
oppressive reality, and instead of increasing it, we want to forget it, evade
it and slip completely into an increasingly credible and perfect virtual
reality. If this is not a dystopian nightmare ... Drones, artificial
intelligence, biotechnology prostheses, wearable computing, automation, sex-
bots.

 _The urban layout has changed_

Vertical development with skyscrapers, horizontal developments with the sprawl
and the hinterland. Increased air pollution, gap between rich and poor,
extreme difference between some neighborhoods. Cities are becoming cyberpunk,
and some have been around for some time.

 _Hacking, surveillance, cyber war_

NSA, Snowden, Prism, Anonymous, the US government hacking the network of my
last university, the Golden Shield Project, leaks, whistleblowers, the power
of the ad tech corporations.

 _The multinationals_

Large business conglomerates closely control the market by often enforcing
laws, exploiting the underdeveloped work of innumerable employees by
compelling them to work at the limits of slavery. All of this, of course, is
aimed at the production of highly prestigious technology objects marketed at
prices often overwhelmed by the iconographic presence of the brand, a new
divinity created and powered by advertising and fetishically adored by
conditioned masses.

"Think privately" is something most people are not able to do right here,
right now. The possibility that Facebook might try (in a future) to exploit my
brain is only the last drop in a dystopian sea.

~~~
lstyls
It still requires consent. If it's really that bad, one can unplug and the
problem goes away. Given you're still here and commenting on HN posts, the
whole "we're in a dystopia already" schtick comes off as self-indulgent.

~~~
tgragnato
I'm sorry if it looks like a self-indulgence speech, it's not really my
intention.

A complete opt-out from _...all that..._ would probably require moving to one
of the Svalbard islands or joining a couple of bedouins in the Sahara desert.

One can sure avoid some of the most uncomfortable things in society, this may
also give you the impression that "it still requires consent", an illusion of
control.

But I was born and raised in a world made up of people inevitably related to
each other. Even if I have personally exercised the ability to choose in what
to be involved with or not, I am aware I don't have any ultimate control over
the whole complex around me.

 _This doesn 't mean I am fine with x,y,z._

That's why the actual society is dystopian in the first place: because
actually the best thing you can do is to speak out in order to raise awareness
about the "we hoped for this, but ended up with that instead".

Disillusionment may be a first step, indulgence not. A BCI technology
developed in the pubblic interest will be a game changer, but I simply don't
see that (any deduction excluded).

~~~
lstyls
Well said. I actually agree with you, apart from the semantics of "dystopia".

And you're totally right that we as members of society don't really have much
choice but to either go all-in or off the grid. The all-or-nothing starkness
is good for nobody but the monopolists.

> A BCI technology developed in the pubblic interest will be a game changer,
> but I simply don't see that.

This seems to be the faustian bargain of capitalism. We get technological
progress at exponential rates, and then the first purpose ends up to be
selling ads.

------
alfonsodev
A publication from 3 days ago:

"Success in recognizing ddigits and monosyllables with high accurary from
brain activity measurement"

[1] [https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-04/tuot-
sir0414...](https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-04/tuot-
sir041417.php)

I have an openBCI at home, this is like a huge motivation to finally build the
helmet and play often :)

------
sAbakumoff
It's becoming boring, ladies, we have seen it all before in 1984: The
government attempts to control not only the speech and actions, but also the
thoughts of its subjects. To entertain unacceptable thoughts is known as
crimethink. "Crimestop" is a way to avoid crimethink by immediately purging
dangerous thoughts from the mind.

------
suyash
Can anyone share more resources on how BCI works, specially non-invasive (no
implants inside brain) BCI ? Papers, blogs etc

~~~
T-A
A few links from recent years:

[http://www.autodidacts.io/neurotech-hardware-roundup-eeg-
bci...](http://www.autodidacts.io/neurotech-hardware-roundup-eeg-bci-tdcs-
neurofeedback/)

[http://gizmodo.com/the-best-brain-reader-your-money-cant-
buy...](http://gizmodo.com/the-best-brain-reader-your-money-cant-buy-
yet-1767234908)

[http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....](http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0105225)

[http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....](http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0137303)

[http://www.zdnet.com/article/ibm-and-xerox-predict-brain-
con...](http://www.zdnet.com/article/ibm-and-xerox-predict-brain-controlled-
apps-will-head-to-smartphones/)

[https://arxiv.org/abs/1509.01338](https://arxiv.org/abs/1509.01338)

[https://sccn.ucsd.edu/wiki/Introduction_To_Modern_Brain-
Comp...](https://sccn.ucsd.edu/wiki/Introduction_To_Modern_Brain-
Computer_Interface_Design)

------
anfractuosity
I'm curious about the skin-hearing technology, in the article it mentions 'a
system of actuators tuned to 16 frequency bands', does that mean say you'd
have 16 actuators each using producing different frequencies? And would the
actuators be used on any part of the body?

~~~
AIMunchkin
[https://www.thestar.com/life/health_wellness/2008/07/02/emot...](https://www.thestar.com/life/health_wellness/2008/07/02/emotichair_delivers_good_vibrations_to_deaf.html)

------
ben_mann
Not clear how they will make a non invasive optical brain interface...

------
pinewurst
Aluminum foil headgear will soon be in fashion.

------
FridgeSeal
The king of creepy wants another vector to harvest information?

What can possibly go wrong here?

------
ganfortran
Good device to start a reality show, Brain Honesty.

