
Amazon Pitches Facial Recognition to Monitor Immigrants - rayvy
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-23/amazon-pitches-facial-recognition-tools-to-monitor-immigrants?srnd=premium
======
makewavesnotwar
Sure and while you're at it why not implement cameras all over every roadway
to automatically ticket you every time you break the speed limit. Or better
yet, why not devise a real time geolocation device to be embedded in cars and
then lobby for it to be nationally adopted so people literally can't speed?

The reality is that very few people want to live in that world and even if we
do fully adopt technologies like this, it doesn't necessarily make us any
safer. A car traveling 30 mph is absolutely as lethal as a car traveling 10
mph faster than that. And I'm much more likely to be killed by a random
traffic accident (only time I've been hit on my bike was by a white women
driving a Ford) or domestic terrorist/psychopath than an immigrant.

So you're pitching huge lifestyle and diplomatic costs without any obvious
benefit... Please count me as a no.

~~~
durkie
This was something that came up shortly after the Snowden documents were
released. I don't remember who made the point (maybe Moxie Marlinspike), but
they pointed out how important it is to be able to break the law. That
breaking the law is an vital means of effecting change in the US: kids smoke
pot illegally and grow up to be adults that push to legalize it. Gay people
are more and more open and successfully push for gay marriage. Etc.

So if you take away people's means of breaking the law (such as auto speed-
limited cars), it's actually striking at something really fundamental in the
ability of the citizens to push for change or to protest. Almost like we want
to have just the right amount of law breaking, although I can't imagine anyone
associated with public policy ever adopting this stance.

~~~
snarfybarfy
And what kind of right would breaking the speed limit push that citizens could
possible want to have changed?

I am all for hardcoded speed limits. Why sell cars that can go faster than
$MaxSpeedInYourCountry ???

Other than that I think you made a good point.

~~~
michaelt

      Why sell cars that can go faster
      than $MaxSpeedInYourCountry ???
    

Politicians today have three choices:

(1) Set and enforce low speed limits, large numbers of drivers make low-impact
complaints.

(2) Set and enforce high speed limits, small numbers of parents of dead
children make high-impact complaints.

(3) Set low speed limits but don't enforce them. Anti-speed campaigners and
road users are both satisfied.

In my country, politicians tend to go for (3). A switch to (1) would not be
without its costs.

~~~
leereeves
In response to aggressive use of traffic cameras, people in a number of cities
and states have passed propositions banning their use.

A switch to (1) might have similar effects, motivating the people to force a
switch to (2).

~~~
JoeAltmaier
_Any_ use of traffic cameras is seen as 'aggressive'. It inevitably results in
hundreds of tickets that otherwise wouldn't be written, affecting hundreds of
citizens in a way they see as intrusive and 'unfair'. For better or worse.

~~~
HillaryBriss
not disagreeing with the first part of your statement, but, for the second
part, a reasonable remedy would be to simply lower the cost of each violation.

e.g. if almost everyone got speeding tickets, but they only cost $15 and
didn't involve any points against the driver's record or insurance premium
hikes, people would simply pay up and probably speed less often. complaints
about the injustice of speeding tickets would probably remain at current
levels.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Tragically, reasonable fees for bad behavior encourage the opposite behavior:
all guilt evaporates and folks feel entitled to the behavior, after all they
can pay for it. Famous studies of charging parent who were late picking up
children from school, everybody started doing it and gladly paying.

~~~
HillaryBriss
Ok, but, could it be that the fee charged to parents was simply too low?

Can't we just view "the right to speed" as a service offered by the government
and then apply the usual price and demand logic to it?

~~~
JoeAltmaier
I've had the same idea - a geometrically increasing 'fee' for road use
depending on speed. Kind of like toll roads, but maybe even most roads. If you
want to spend the money (and have the money, thus likely the deep pockets to
compensate for damage) then go ahead!

------
tinktank
It's just another use-case for them I suppose. Interesting to see how, as tech
companies become bigger, they go the same way as companies in all the other
industries. I'm not surprised, but I am disappointed.

~~~
alexnewman
Stupid question. I actually am a big fan of no borders but what's wrong with
this? Seems like America entering the new millennium.

Edited also why was this downvoted?

~~~
stonecraftwolf
Because constant surveillance of a targeted group will be systematically
abused. And because next is using facial recognition to monitor other groups —
LGBT, activists, political opponents.

That is extremely frightening coming from an administration that is
increasingly using violent and elimitionist language to levy completely made
up charges at immigrants, LGBT, and particularly political opponents.

~~~
noobermin
Do people have a right to not be identified in public? In public, your right
to privacy doesn't protect you from having your picture being taken. Then,
what if someone identifies you from your picture? How about if they use a CV
system to speed it up? What's the argument here?

BTW, as I expand upon below, I'm against surveillance of private
communications, I think we all are. As far as I understand it, this is not
surveillance, this is identification technology, which is different.

~~~
ridgeguy
Scale matters.

If it were only warm-blooded individual humans identifying you, there wouldn't
be much potential for abuse. In the 1960s, your privacy was pretty much
preserved even in public spaces. Unless you were a genuine person of interest,
worthy of expending costly observational resources.

Now? Drive anywhere, walk anywhere - machines log your travels. It's a perfect
recipe for abuse. Just scale, is all it takes.

~~~
DoreenMichele
At one time, rock stars were essentially anonymous and could have relatively
normal lives when not on tour. The audience was huge and they were essentially
faceless.

Then TV, music videos and the practice of having huge screens broadcasting the
faces of the band to the audience ruined that.

KISS used face paint and that helped protect their identity, but when they got
too big, you saw Gene Simmons wearing a mask on dates to try to preserve his
privacy, yet everyone knew the masked guy was Gene Simmons.

------
FilterSweep
Yikes. I’ve heard of some American citizens being mistaken for illegal
immigrants and being detained with no recuse[0], I could only imagine how bad
it could get if the machine errors.

[0] [https://nypost.com/2018/04/27/ice-wrongfully-detained-
nearly...](https://nypost.com/2018/04/27/ice-wrongfully-detained-
nearly-1500-americans-report/)

~~~
crististm
According to some of my team mates, a computer is never wrong. And they would
gladly replace the justice system with AI ones. They program computers and
they should know better but I am lost wondering at what level they are
thinking to even go down this road.

~~~
gowthamgts12
Always remember its really hard to get 100% accuracy on AI.

~~~
SmellyGeekBoy
But is it more accurate than human judgement?

~~~
gowthamgts12
Well, it certainly depends on the person doing that, like accuracy of AI
depends on the programmer.

------
godzillabrennus
Makes sense.

Jeff Bezos wants to provide the tech that lets Washington form the first pre-
crime unit.

What they didn’t tell us in the movie was that the precogs were AI.

------
hnaccy
More evidence that the invention of the transistor marked the doom of
individual liberty.

By the time I die I assume we'll all be tracked at all times or well on the
way to that.

~~~
SmellyGeekBoy
> By the time I die I assume we'll all be tracked at all times or well on the
> way to that.

If you have a smartphone this is already the case.

------
alaxsxaq
Regarding speed cameras. I was driving around the Netherlands and saw speed
cameras for the first time (I'm from the US) in Apeldoorn. There were signs
that warned drivers about them. In the US, in several rural areas have
electronic signs at the edge of town, just outside of the limit change, which
warn you when you are exceeding the limit through town. I would have no
problem at all with permanent enforcement systems provided they were
accompanied by advance warnings. If I am so inattentive to my driving that I
miss the warnings and get a ticket, so be it. It is much safer (and should be
much cheaper) than randomly placed patrol cars performing radar/laser speed
enforcement.

~~~
philipodonnell
Speed cameras are one of those things that seems good as a concept but are
always abused in practice. We seem to be unable to remove the profit motive
from local governments so the only real recourse is to deny them the ability
to profit from an activity that will always be abused.

> It is much safer (and should be much cheaper) than randomly placed patrol
> cars performing radar/laser speed enforcement.

The fact that it has a lower ROI to post an officer+radar than the ROI from a
speed camera is a feature, not a bug. It helps control abusive revenue seeking
behavior.

~~~
Faark
> We seem to be unable to remove the profit motive from local governments

As in, "such changes would be hard to achieve currently in the current US", or
not possible in principle? I'd disagree with the later one. Redirect those
funds to the federal budget and I'd expect such abuse to plummet. Tragedy of
the commons can sometimes work in our favor as well, at least if we manage to
set up system accordingly.

------
YeGoblynQueenne
Could websites use all the data they collect about their users to determine
when it's a good idea to auto-play videos, and when not? Because I, for once,
would sure like this functionality implemented on Bloomberg, among others.

------
themistokl1k
anybody can elaborate on why amazonians can't pull a Google and make them drop
the contract?

~~~
sharcerer
No company employees other than Google are known to be as vocal about business
decisions,AFAIK. Culture matters. The culture which Larry,Sergey and others
started is reaping benefits today. I might be wrong,but if we look at
companies in general, Google is the closest to having a democracy-type of
vibe.

~~~
gowthamgts12
Couldn't agree more. I don't think Amazon listens to its employees on how to
run a business.

------
josecyc
Amazon needs a manifesto

~~~
biocomputation
Well, it's clear they already have one.

------
transpy
It's like Amazon and Google are competing on evilness.

------
dawidw
1984 is coming...

------
nodesocket
Unrelated, but when, and if Bloomberg is found guilty of pushing the fake
Supermicro China story there should be a penalty for publishing clickbait
headlines that are, for lack of a better term, fake news.

I know for a fact HN blacklists conservative news outlets such as Breitbart
across the board. It seems a little biased and double standard to just let
Bloomberg continue to push outrage and in some cases baseless stories and have
them make the front page of HN.

/rant

~~~
exabrial
You will be downvoted for speaking your mind, but well said. Hn doesn't claim
to be free speech forum which is quite unfortunate, as most of the discussion
here is usually academic.

------
mohammedbin
I am not an American and I obviously have no right to meddle in your affairs.
But only today Trump tweeted out Obama being against immigration and then from
their the rabbit hole went deeper and there was a video of gasp, bernie
sanders calling open borders a "Koch brother" conspiracy.

I'm beginning to wonder if anyone high up in America really has any integrity?
I fail to see anyone who is consistent in their views and actions.

Google cooperating with Chinese censors knowing fully well how China
persecutes Muslims (and that is something I do get emotional over), and
Schmidt talking about bifurcation of internet soundbyte to make a case when
its clear that the so called bifurcation is because of language.

It just all seems so staged at this point. And I don't mean to insult my
America brothers here but I just want to know who actually is on the "right"
side?

Edit: I see that the person who replied "politics I'd cesspool of.." Has his
comment deleted. I understand that this is defeatist attitude and we are all
smart people but better to talk than to silence him. Silencing is the reason I
never saw this 10 year old video.

~~~
rdtsc
> bernie sanders calling open borders a "Koch brother" conspiracy.

Quite right. It wasn't just that Bernie disagrees with open borders, in that
video he is visibly upset. He really doesn't like it.

(It was the Vox interview I assume, unless you saw another one)

Also if you are old enough you might remember large anti-globalization
protests around G8, Bilderberg and other such meetings.

It is kind of baffling how just a decade ago left groups were getting
teargassed fighting globalization and now they are openly advocating it.

Such is the power of propaganda. It is extremely effective and could turn pink
into blue, and then yellow with some moderate effort.

I suggest everyone read Chomsky and Herman's Manufacturing Consent. It was
actual when it was written and just as actual even if not more today.

Speaking of Chomsky, find his writings on NAFTA and globalization as well. It
might also surprise you what he has to say.

~~~
joshuamorton
There's a wide variety of positions between "open borders" and "forcibly take
refugee children away from their families and put both in detention
facilities".

One can object to the latter without supporting the former.

~~~
exabrial
Please name a crime where you are allowed to take your children with you when
you're arrested.

~~~
joshuamorton
Requesting asylum is not a crime, so I'm confused by this request.

~~~
exabrial
I think that's more than valid. Does doing so require always crossing border
illegally? Also, what percentage of people are under a legitimate threat of
their lives (or relatives)?

~~~
joshuamorton
Why are you focusing on people who entered the country illegally? The trump
admin has separated families who crossed the border legally at ports of entry
and then requested asylum[1].

[1]: [https://www.aclu.org/blog/immigrants-rights/immigrants-
right...](https://www.aclu.org/blog/immigrants-rights/immigrants-rights-and-
detention/fact-checking-family-separation)

------
wangyjx
If not Amazon, another company will do business with gov. Face recognition is
mature enough, there is no very high barrier. Even if US gov doesnt adopt such
technology, another gov will do and already done. It is just business.

~~~
ardy42
> If not Amazon, another company will do business with gov. Face recognition
> is mature enough, there is no very high barrier. Even if US gov doesnt adopt
> such technology, another gov will do.

> It is just business.

Guns are a mature technology, and pretty easy to use. If I don't do the hit
for Vinny, some other hitman will, so I might as well make some cash. It is
just business.

The fact that someone else may perform a morally dubious action if you don't
does not provide any justification for you to perform that action.

~~~
wangyjx
gun is gun, please don't mix together. Face recognition doesn't attack people.
I admit that someone might feel uncomfortable but it can protect you in
another cases. (another privacy vs safety argument)

Needless to say this technology can only deploy in public places. If someone
appear in public places, why you think he would like to become invisible to
all others.

In the meanwhile, I agree that no gov employee can be authorized to access the
data without limitation. There must be some laws to regulate its usage.

~~~
ardy42
> gun is gun, please don't mix together. Face recognition doesn't attack
> people. I admit that someone might feel uncomfortable but it can protect you
> in another cases.

Guns don't attack people either. There's a saying: "guns don't kill people,
people kill people."

~~~
skummetmaelk
And they kill each other much more the easier it is to do so...

------
ozgurozkan
Don’t Worry!!! Face recog startup founder here. Amazon’s tech only allows them
to monitor a specific people list in real time. So search period should be
limited. Otherwise it’s so expensive to do that. It only tracks for specific
target list on real time cameras or photos. When it comes to searching on
archives Amazon is so expensive to do it. As Reminisce Inc we are a photo
delivery company. We have a face search tech ( similar to face recog but
different, ours is exponentially faster than existing ones). Our tech is the
only solution that allows us to search for specific list in archives. However
we use our tech only to deliver souvenir photography to event attendees. We
will not sell it to government. You can check for your photos in our db here
it gives you the result in 15 seconds
[https://www.reminis.app](https://www.reminis.app)

~~~
mLuby
Kudos for the principled stance. Hope you can maintain that in the face of
investor pressure.

Are you saying it's prohibitively expensive to archive footage to later recog
against (storage), or is the recog itself the expensive part (compute)?

~~~
ozgurozkan
The first thing we tell to investors is we are not building a security or
surveillance product and we don't have a vision like that.

Storing and indexing (computation but not search) is expensive on AWS.
Practically 1000 face metadata is not more than 4MB's of data in practice. 4MB
face data is 1$ on AWS. Just one surveillance camera output archive + real
time recognition costs 400$ / month according to my calculation.

Search part can be extremely fast with postgres in a special setting. It's
kinda instant.

