Reading Philipp Lessen's post on Spiegel's article about Google Goggle's face recognition makes me freaked out.
I thought Goggle was a very cool application allowing user to capture objects in real world and obtain information about them, e.g., an artwork, a book, a place of interest. All you need to do is to use your cell phone to capture the image(even video) and upload it using Google Goggle. Traveling could be much easier when information could be obtained precisely and instantly. However, I never thought about the privacy issue the application may bring about.
According to Spiegel, Goggle now lacks the ability of face recognition. Why the application wants face recognition?
this may include the beautiful female stranger who just entered the coffee place. If there happens to be a photo of her in the vast depths of the internet, then there’s a good chance Google has it stored – and everyone taking a photograph of the person in question can now try to identify her.
The above example is NO science fiction, it may become true in the near future. Tim O'Reilly received the demo version a few months ago and thought it was "a taste of the future".
If the technique and the service becomes real, "We might be facing the end of anomity in public space". You even have no option to change your name to get rid of the web presence because you are so tied to your past by face recognition.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, gave a talk in San Francisco at the Crunchie awards. According to Zuckerberg,
"People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people. That social norm is just something that has evolved over time."
I'm very uncomfortable of putting personal information online, including photos, profiles and preferences. The reason I'm still using Facebook is that I believe I only share information with certain people I know and Facebook can help me to share photos effectively with many friends. However, I pay careful attention with information I put out there as well as access control.
Zuckerberg also mentioned:
"We view it as our role in the system to constantly be innovating and be updating what our system is to reflect what the current social norms are.
Obviously, the social definition and the perception of "privacy" has been changed. But not as what Zuckerberg said that they "reflect" the current social norm. Facebook actually is one of the influential factors have contributed to such change.
According to Kirkpatrick, Zuckerberg said so because he wanted it to be true. Even Facebook users realize "the social norm of privacy is out of date" and make the user content public on Facebook, the website would receive more page views and advertising revenue.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Companies like Google and Facebook show less respect to user's privacy for their own good, even they say they are "reflecting the social norm", and they are trying to make people believe that privacy is not important. Under such circumstances, the awareness of privacy is becoming more essential and should let everyone gain a better understanding of it. Even you are comfortable with everything public, you still need to know the potential consequences and the what the companies are using your information for.
0 comments:
Post a Comment