In the open world game from Ubisoft Guard dogs (and its sequels)lets you quickly scan any NPC you meet and find out facts about them, including their name, address, criminal record, etc. And now two people have essentially developed this technology in real life, using metas smart glasses and mostly off-the-shelf technology and software, providing a frightening glimpse into our future.
As reported by 404 mediaTwo Harvard students have built working smart glasses that use facial recognition technology to automatically identify someone based on their face. Additionally, the glasses use this information to track down other details about the stranger, including address, phone number, previous photos and family members. According to the two students, AnhPhu Nguyen and Caine Ardayfio, they did this to raise awareness of what is possible with current technology and they have no plans to release it publicly.
Nguyen and Ardayfio are calling the project I-XRAY and showed a demo of it in action on social media earlier this week. In the video posted on Twitter, the couple managed to identify several strangers without asking them for details. However, some of the data turned out to be inaccurate when the duo spoke to the people.
“The motivation for this was mainly because we thought it was interesting and cool,” said Nguyen 404 media. Apparently other people they showed it to also thought it was “really cool,” and some said it could be used for “networking” or “making funny videos.” Luckily, someone also mentioned to them how incredibly dangerous this technology could be in the wrong hands. “A guy could just find a girl’s home address on the train and just follow them home,” Nguyen said.
As highlighted by 404 mediaThis type of smart glasses facial scanning technology has been around for a few years. But Google and Facebook, two companies that worked on ultimately decided not to release their software.
But you don’t need huge technical resources and money to build your own Guard dogs Super glasses that can immediately blow away anyone you meet on the street. Nguyen and Ardayfio’s I-XRAY uses Meta’s Ray Bans and that publicly available facial recognition service Pimeyes Scan a person’s face with hidden cameras in the glasses and then identify them. This information is then used to search the Internet for phone numbers, other photos, family information and addresses.
“We showed people photos of them from kindergarten, and they had never seen the photo before,” Ardayfio said. “Most people were surprised at how much data they had online.” They were once able to show a stranger their mother’s phone number by simply scanning their face.
“I think people could definitely use it [the idea of I-XRAY] and run with it,” said Ardayfio. “When people come forward with this idea, I think it’s really bad. I hope the awareness we spread about protecting your data outweighs the potential negative impacts.” The duo have included information on how you can protect yourself a large document about the project which is freely available online.
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