In an open world game from Ubisoft Watch Dogs (and its sequels)you can quickly scan any NPC you meet and discover facts about them, including their name, address, criminal history, and so on. And now two people have essentially created this technology in real life, using Meta’s shrewd glasses and mostly off-the-shelf technology and software, providing a terrifying glimpse into our future.
As reported 404 Mediatwo Harvard students have built working shrewd glasses that operate facial recognition technology and automatically identify a person based on their face. Moreover, the glasses operate this information to track down other details about the stranger, including their address, phone number, previous photos and family members. According to two students, AnhPhu Nguyen and Caine Ardayfio, they did it to raise awareness about the possibilities of current technology and do not plan to post it publicly.
Nguyen and Ardayfio have named the project I-XRAY and showed off a demo on social media earlier this week. In a video posted to Twitter, the pair was able to identify multiple strangers without asking them for any details, although some details turned out to be misleading when the duo spoke to these people.
“The motivation for it was mainly because we thought it was interesting and cool,” Nguyen said 404 Media. Apparently other people they showed it to also thought it was “really cool,” with some suggesting it could be used for “making connections” or “making funny videos.” But luckily, someone also mentioned to them how incredibly threatening this technology could be in the wrong hands. “Some guy could just find some girl’s home address on the train and just follow her home,” Nguyen said.
As he noticed 404 Mediathis type of face scanning technology using shrewd glasses has been around for several years. But Google and Facebook, the two companies that worked on it, ultimately decided not to release its software.
But you don’t need a lot of technical resources and money to build your own Watch Dogs great glasses that will instantly annoy anyone you meet on the street. Nguyen and Ardayfio’s I-XRAY uses Meta i Ray Bans publicly available Pimeyes facial recognition service scan someone’s face using hidden cameras in the glasses and then identify that person. This information is then used to search the Internet for phone numbers, other photos, family information and addresses.
“We showed people their kindergarten photos, and they had never even seen the photo before,” Ardayfio said. “Most people were surprised by the amount of data they have on the Internet.” They once managed to show a stranger their mother’s phone number after scanning their faces.
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