Augmented ID App For Smartphones: Will It Encourage Criminal Behavior? (w/ Video)

Who is that guy, anyway?
Recognizr, augmented ID app for smart phones. (Image:TAT)

(PhysOrg.com) -- When you snap a photo of your daughter Lucy with your smart phone camera, Polar Rose software can identify her face and automatically store her photo in your Lucy file. Now, Polar Rose along with another Swedish company TAT (The Astonishing Tribe) has taken the Polar Rose software one step beyond... into augmented ID.

Taking a winter vacation on the sunny beaches of San Diego, you decide you want the scoop on the looker in the string bikini. Just capture her face with your new smart phone augmented ID app, the Recognizr, and you can hook into all of her sites... If she is signed up for the augmented ID service.

Recognizr uses your subject’s facial features as a 3-D model, and matches them to others stored in a special database. A full match will bring up her profile from networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, , , You Tube, and other popular sites where she is registered, and where she permits you, a stranger, to find her.

Ah... he's on Facebook. I'll check him out....
Once your subject is "recognized," the Recognizr shows you where you can obtain information about him or her. (Image:TAT)

The Recognizr, in prototype right now, was presented last week at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Dan Gärdenfors, head of User Experience Research at TAT, said that what the developers had in mind was a way to bridge the gap between how people “used to meet in the real world” with how they are now meeting through social networking.

In other words, instead of approaching the gal in the bikini and introducing yourself in person, you get to know her name, her friends, her likes and dislikes, and anything else she usually shares with her friends. Then you get to decide what your next move will be.

Augmented ID is a cool technology. Personally, I would not want my daughter Lucy to sign up for the service; it’s fraught with all kinds of predatory dangers, and not just for women. Perhaps though, the same technology would be better used for industry.

More information: TAT
Polar Rose
Technology Review

© 2010 PhysOrg.com

Citation: Augmented ID App For Smartphones: Will It Encourage Criminal Behavior? (w/ Video) (2010, February 25) retrieved 19 March 2024 from https://phys.org/news/2010-02-augmented-id-app-smartphones-criminal.html
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

Explore further

Point your phone to ID places

0 shares

Feedback to editors