IN THE UK, a court case against
South Wales Police over its public
trial of face-tracking cameras
began last week, backed by
human rights group Liberty. Ed
Bridges, an office worker from
Cardiff whose image was captured
during a test in 2017, says the
technology is an unlawful violation
of privacy, an accusation that the
force denies. At least two other
UK police forces have carried out
similar trials in the past four years.
Avoiding the camera’s gaze has
landed others in trouble. Recently,
the BBC filmed a man being fined
£90 for disorderly behaviour after
hiding his face while walking past
a police face recognition trial in
east London. “If I want to cover
my face, I’ll cover my face,” the
unnamed man said. “It’s not
for them to tell me not to
cover my face.”
He and Bridges are among
those fighting back against the
encroachment of pervasive
surveillance into everyday lives.
“People are excited about the
innovation and convenience of
technology, but are becoming
increasingly mindful about howintrusive it is,” says Mariann Hardey
at Durham University in the UK.
Scandals such as the
Cambridge Analytica affair
have made us more aware
of the risks of handing over
too much information. People
are increasingly focused on
understanding how their
data is collected and used.
Legislation is being
strengthened to provide support
for those who want to oppose the
surveillance state. For example,the European Union’s General
Data Protection Regulation,
introduced last year, offers people
much more control over their data.
Politicians are also realising
the dangers of allowing the
technology to go too far. US
Democratic congresswoman
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is
one of the most high-profile
opponents of face recognition. “I
don’t want to see an authoritariansurveillance state, whether it’s run
by a government or whether it’s
run by five corporations,” she said
last week. Ocasio-Cortez also
referenced existing US privacy
legislation, including a woman’s
right to privacy when having an
abortion. “In our right to privacy,
this is about our right to our
entire body,” she said.
She isn’t the only politician
taking up arms against extensive
surveillance. “Orwell wrote 1984
as a warning, not an instruction
manual,” says Jo Swinson, a
Liberal Democrat MP in the
UK. “We should be very wary
of technology without proper
debate and scrutiny about the
implications for personal privacy.”
Even some Amazon
shareholders have been spooked.
The firm sells face-recognition
technology, known as Rekognition,
to governments and police
forces around the world, including
the FBI and the Orlando Police
Department. Last week, investors
who believe the system is
infringing on people’s civil liberties
forced two votes at Amazon’s
annual meeting of shareholders.
The first asked whether
the firm should stop supplying
the technology to government
agencies, while the second called
for an independent study of its
effects on human rights. Both
failed to pass. In response,
Amazon said it wasn’t aware of
a single report of the technology
being used in a harmful manner.
This might make you think
that the battle against face
recognition is already lost.
But, as the number of individual
skirmishes being fought indicates,
this is an argument that won’t be
going away any time soon. ❚1 June 2019 | New Scientist | 9DNA has emerged as a tantalising
way to store digital information in
recent years, but it comes with a
significant problem: the molecule
is so fragile that individual DNA
strands rapidly degrade. A new
technique to boost its survivability
could see the molecules used to
archive our data.
DNA has been floated as a
reliable medium for large data
storage, partly because it has a
theoretical storage capacity of about
4.55 million terabytes per gram.
Unfortunately, the fragile molecule
deteriorates unless it is stored under
cool and dry conditions.
“Then you have the mass and the
size of the chamber in which you put
the DNA,” says Robert Grass at ETH
Zurich, Switzerland - so, in practice,
it isn’t really possible to build
facilities that store huge amounts
of data in just a few grams.
Grass and his colleagues worked
in partnership with Microsoft to
develop a DNA storage method that
makes the molecule more robust.
The method involves polymer-
coated particles that help bind
strands of DNA together and
increase their storage density. The
bound DNA strands are then coated
with a protective layer of silica that
limits environmental damage.
The researchers compared the
longevity of unprotected DNA with
their coated version by encoding
samples of each with data - using
the DNA’s genetic code in place of
digital 0s and 1s - before subjecting
them to 70°C temperatures and
50 per cent relative humidity.
Within a week, more than
98 per cent of the unprotected
DNA was no longer readable.
The encapsulated DNA was
still readable after two weeks
(Advanced Functional Materials,
doi.org/c6dg).
The team estimates that
encapsulated DNA has a half-life of
up to 90 years, if stored at 20°C. ❚
DNA data storage
made more reliable
with silica coating
Data storage
“We should be very wary
of technology without
proper debate about
personal privacy”Analysis SurveillanceThe backlash against face recognition has begun As the
technology is being deployed more widely, campaigners and
politicians are fighting back, says Chris Stokel-WalkerIANDAVIDSO
N/ALA
MYLIVE^ NEWSProtesters want
to put an end to
face recognitionDonna Lu