The Weekly Cypher is curated to keep you up-to-date on the latest in biometric and cybersecurity news. Here are a few headlines you may have missed this week.
AI Experts Question Amazon’s Facial Recognition Technology |New York Times
At least 25 prominent artificial-intelligence researchers, including experts at Google, Facebook and Microsoft, have signed a letter calling on Amazon to stop selling its facial-recognition technology to law enforcement agencies because it is biased against women and people of color.
Your Finger Is Now Your Ticket At 11 MLB Ballparks |Yahoo! Finance
By now, you’ve likely seen Clear fingerprint-identification kiosks at an airport as you waited in line. The company is in 26 US airports, and lets you scan two fingers to skip the ID part of the line, for a membership price of $15 per month. But soon, more people may first associate Clear with sports. The company this week is launching at three more Major League Baseball venues: Camden Yards, Target Field and Globe Life Park. That brings its total to 11 ballparks, out of MLB’s 30 teams. With MLB ballpark attendance declining, the league hopes the convenience of skipping turnstile lines could be a genuine sweetener for fans.
Facial Recognition Is Coming To Hotels To Make Check-In Easier, And Much Better | Fast Company
Alibaba has created the hotel of the future – Fly Zoo, which is reportedly a Chinese pun for “must stay,” is a 290-room ultra-modern boutique hotel in Hangzhou, China that lets guests play with technology, check in with ease, and spend the night in the future for a low price of around $205 – and at the cost of your privacy. Rather than keys and cards, FlyZoo uses facial recognition in the elevator and at the room to open doors. Inside, command Tmall Genie, Alibaba’s voice technology, to adjust the temperature, lights and curtains.
5 Ways Biometrics Are Going Mainstream For Payments | Payments Source
While fingerprint recognition is becoming more commonplace, other biometric technologies are rapidly entering the market such as voice, facial and even vein pattern recognition. One area being heavily explored by banks and card issuers is the adoption of fingerprint recognition for contactless card payments in lieu of PIN numbers.
What Sony’s Robot Dog Teaches Us About Biometric Data Privacy | CNET
Aibo, Sony’s robo-dog, is a $2,900 companion robot that Sony claims “learns its environment and develops relationships with people.” Aibo even enlists a camera in its nose to scan faces and determine who’s who so it can react to them differently. Currently, Sony doesn’t sell Aibo in Illionois due to the state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA), which regulates the collection of biometric data, including face scans.
