China is implementing a new surveillance tool to identify people in the streets. Using ‘gait recognition’, this software is capable of scanning people’s body shapes and the way they walk to identify them.
Despite some resistance to the idea, particularly from the outside world, Chinese police are ramping up on artificial-intelligence and data-driven surveillance tools.
Huang Yongzhen, CEO of Watric, described that the system can detect people from up to 50 meters away through hidden cameras. A key advantage of the tool is that it is able to detect people even when their faces are concealed. After finding prime candidates, the system can then confirm a user’s identity through facial recognition, using high-resolution images of a person’s face.
Watrix’s gait technology initially makes use of a video feed of the person walking. It then cuts a silhouette and creates a 3D model of the person walking. The company claims that it can detect the relevant people at a 94 percent success rate. However, the analysis is not performed in real-time.
“Gait analysis can’t be fooled by simply limping, walking with splayed feet or hunching over, because we’re analysing all the features of an entire body,” said Huang.
Currently, Chinese police are using facial recognition to find people in crowds, as well as jaywalkers. There are concerns as to whether this is too much power is being put in the government’s hands over people’s privacy.
Despite this implementation, the technology used isn’t new. Scientists in Japan, the United Kingdom, and the US have been researching gait recognition past a decade. Watrix’ involvement represents a rare occasion where the technology has gone through commercialisation.
Though controversy surrounding this issue typically has to do the possibility of totalitarian sentiments, Huang stresses that the technology can also be used to spot people in distress, such as fallen elderly folk. Whether this new surveillance tool will end up being beneficial or a danger to society, remains to be seen.
(Source: AP News)
