20/05/2010

Google review face recognition features

Google have already gotten their hands slapped over their Street View and Buzz chat services but its their facial recognition technology that could be the next privacy flashpoint, according to CEO Eric Schmidt.

A series of public disputes over privacy issues have caused the Google management team to review the launch of new technologies.

After revealing it had accidentally recorded data from unsecured Wi-Fi connections, Googles Street View service faced a backlash over privacy. Rolled out in 2007, the service takes street level pictures of neighbourhoods and configures them onto an online map. Street View was originally only available in select cities in the States but its since been expanded to include cities around the globe as well as more rural areas.

Google have also only just settled public outcry over their social networking site Buzz. Critics claimed the service exposed private information without confirming the prior approval of users. It set Spanish, French, German and Italian data protection authorities onto investigating their practises.

In the wake of measures like these, Google have been hesitant to roll-out new technologies. In their blog, published last week, Schmidt revealed that they had been mistakenly capturing payload data from non-password protected Wi-Fi networks despite earlier assurances that they would only collect data on publically broadcast Wi-Fi networks.

Google already has some face recognition technology in its image sharing services,Picasa and Google Goggles. Picasa lets users tag a photo, and then searches through the database and recognises that person in other snaps. Google Goggles offers a similar, but slightly different, service. It lets users take a picture of a painting or a movie poster and then relays back information about it, who directed/stared in it or, in the case of a picture, who painted it.

Its a tricky one. On the one hand Google, eager to add yet another service to their remit, want to stay ahead of the competition who are marching ahead with the technology. There are fears that adding facial recognition technology to services like Google Goggles will make it far too easy to track people online and open up opportunities for internet stalkers.

Google may not have wanted privacy policies to be the topic of debate at the annual Google I/O developer conference last Wednesday but with new technology pushing boundaries, they have no choice.

Schmidt wouldnt make any solid promises as to whether Google would hold back on the facial recognition technology, only telling the FT that anything they do in that area, "would be highly, highly planned, discussed and reviewed".