facial recognition

Apple executive Philip Schiller presents a wireless charging system, displayed with the new iPhone X and Apple Watch alongside cordless headphones called AirPods.

National

Apple Unveils Three New iPhones, But The Watch Sends Shares Up

7:18pm September 12, 2017

by Alina Selyukh

Apple is freeing the watch from the iPhone, giving it a direct cellphone connection. The special-release iPhone X ditches the home button, gets facial recognition and wireless charging.

Charles Camiel looks into the camera for a facial recognition test before boarding his JetBlue flight to Aruba at Logan International Airport in Boston.

National

Facial Recognition May Boost Airport Security But Raises Privacy Worries

4:03pm June 26, 2017

by Asma Khalid

If you travel from Boston's Logan Airport to Aruba on JetBlue you can use your face as identification rather than a passport. Similar experiments in facial recognition are underway at other airports.

Eight different real faces were shown to a monkey. The images were then reconstructed using analyzing electrical activity from 205 neurons recorded while the monkey was viewing the faces.

Cracking The Code That Lets The Brain ID Any Face, Fast

5:14pm June 01, 2017

by Jon Hamilton

People and other primates have an amazing ability to instantly recognize faces. Scientists at Caltech found that we do that by having 205 specialized brain cells divvy up the task.

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A child takes a facial recognition test in which he is asked to match the face on the top to one of the faces on the bottom.

Brain Area That Recognizes Faces Gets Busier And Better In Young Adults

6:38pm January 05, 2017

by Jon Hamilton

From birth through age 30 or so, our ability to recognize faces keeps improving, research shows. At first, kids discern adult faces better than other kids' mugs. Not so after adolescence.

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A New York Police Department security camera set up along a street in New York City on Aug. 26.

National

It Ain't Me, Babe: Researchers Find Flaws In Police Facial Recognition Technology

12:52pm October 25, 2016

by Laura Sydell

Nearly half of American adults have been entered into law enforcement facial recognition databases, a new report shows. But problems with the accuracy of the technology could affect innocent people.

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Facebook's Moments app uses facial recognition technology to group photos based on the friends who are in them. Amid privacy concerns in Europe and Canada, the versions launched in those regions excluded the facial recognition feature.

National

Facebook's Facial Recognition Software Is Different From The FBI's. Here's Why

3:00pm May 18, 2016

by Naomi LaChance

Every time one of its 1.65 billion users uploads a photo to Facebook and tags someone, that person is helping the facial recognition algorithm. Its accuracy rate is said to be higher than the FBI's.

Researchers found that passport screeners have an error rate of about 15 percent when they're evaluating whether faces match passport photos.

Security Agents Often Miss When Passports Don't Match Faces

6:26pm November 06, 2014

by Anne Miller

The people checking travelers' passports aren't great at catching fake or stolen documents. One solution might be to screen the screeners and only hire those with a talent for recognizing faces.