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In this case, the influence that comes with being a social media influencer can be detrimental to a person’s social life. According to the New York Post, Eva Lopez is suing the NYPD “for defamation, libel, slander, intentional infliction of emotional distress and negligence” after the police used her photo on a wanted poster for a robbery. After a friend contacted Lopez about the situation at hand, she soon learned that she was a wanted woman, which she notes left her in disbelief. “I thought it was something fake,” said the Instagram influencer, who also happens to be a native of Queens. “I really couldn’t believe the police would put me on a wanted poster.”
The New York City Police Department has revealed its use of Patternizr, a new tool that lets officers quickly sort through case files, as reported by The Washington Post . The software works by using automated pattern-recognition algorithms, allowing it to sort through “hundreds of thousands” of NYPD records. It specifically looks for similarities, or patterns, between cases. Right now, the software pretty much focuses on theft and larceny. Looking through records to link certain crimes to each other is something that would typically require countless manual hours. Patternizr cuts down on time, which could ultimately save the department money in the long run. In addition, The Washington Post reported that it’s a comprehensive system, looking into all of New York’s 77 precincts. That allows analysts to see what’s going on across the entire city with ease. Patternizr has been in use since 2016, but the NYPD only publicly shared it in an issue of INFORMS Journal on Applied Analytics...
Grant Williams was a Wu-Tang Clan affiliate who lived an otherwise quiet life in Staten Island, NY. The Hill reports that Williams, who was friends with Ghostface Killa and frequently worked in the studio when the Wu would record their now-classic albums, had his whole life changed after Shdell Lewis was gunned down in front of the Shelton Houses. At that time, the NYPD was struggling to find Lewis’s killer — and some witnesses claimed, without any evidence, that Williams was the gunman. Furthermore, according to the AP, prosecutors linked a hat with a Wu-Tang Clan logo to Williams. However, the hat was reportedly never DNA tested. There was, ultimately, no credible evidence to confirm that Williams was responsible for Lewis’s death — but that didn’t stop a jury from convicting him of second-degree murder back in 1997. He was sentenced to 25 years to life. And with that, Grant Williams went from being a Wu-Tang Clan affiliate to a convicted murderer. Recently, however, Williams was...
Facial recognition has been widely criticized for the risks it poses to vulnerable communities. The technology typically reinforces pre-existing social biases, as seen by its inability to read anyone who isn’t a white man . It also poses severe privacy risks. Facial recognition makes it easy for government agencies to develop continuous, mass surveillance of vulnerable communities. With all of these risks, it’s not a technology that most people would want to use on kids. Despite that, Lockport City School District in New York is trying to test a facial and object recognition system called “Aegis.” In September, the district used $1.4 million of the $4.2 million it received in funding through the Smart Schools Bond Act to install the system, Lockport Journal reported . Superintendent Michelle Bradley announced plans to begin testing the system on June 3. Bradley described the test as an “initial implementation phase.” That means the school wanted to test the system for any necessary...
Apple is currently being sued by a New York teenager who claims Apple Stores’ facial recognition technology misidentified him as a robber in Boston, New Jersey, Delaware, and New York City. Now, Apple has come forward to claim it doesn’t scan people’s faces within its stores, as reported by The Verge . However, Apple isn’t the only company named in the lawsuit, so the teenager’s claims can’t be ruled out yet. On Monday, Ousmane Bah filed a lawsui t against both Apple and security firm, Security Industry Specialists Inc., for a “traumatic” false arrest. In November 2018, the NYPD arrested Bah at 4 a.m. with an arrest warrant that “included a photo of a suspect that did not resemble Mr. Bah.” It was NYPD detective, John Reinhold, who noticed Bah looked “nothing like” the suspect. He told Bah that Apple’s security technology “identifies suspects of theft using facial recognition technology.” The Verge contacted Reinhold, who said that Apple doesn’t “technically” have facial recognition...
Facial recognition software has been critiqued time and time again for its inability to actually recognize people — especially if they’re Blac k. Despite that, many stores moved forward with implementing facial recognition into their security software, but it may have caught up to one. On Monday, Ousmane Bah — an 18-year-old from New York — filed a claim against Apple and the security firm Security Industry Specialists Inc. Bah claims that he was detained in a “traumatic” false arrest due to misidentification by Apple’s facial recognition software. According to the suit, Bah received a summons from a court in Boston while he was still in high school. He was accused of stealing $1,200 worth of Apple products from an Apple Store on May 31, 2018. However, the suit notes that Bah has never been to Boston. Furthermore, on the day the summons said the theft took place, the suit says Bah was attending his senior prom in Manhattan. The claims did not end with just Boston. Bah was also...
In 2016, New York governor Andrew Cuomo shared an initiative to “Reimagine New York’s Crossings,” which included installing advanced cameras, license plate readers, and facial recognition technology. The plan began to raise concerns amongst advocacy groups. New York Civil Liberties Union senior staff attorney, Mariko Hirose, described it as being one step closer to a “dystopian world.” New York City, however, carried on with the plans. Now, a Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) email obtained by The Wall Street Journal shows a 2018 technology test on NYC’s Robert F. Kennedy Bridge was a complete bust. On Nov. 29, the journal reported that an MTA official emailed a senior staffer in Cuomo’s administration, saying the “initial period for the proof of concept testing at the RFK for facial recognition has been completed and failed with no faces (0%) being detected within acceptable parameters.” Despite the program’s failures, the same email stated a second hard drive containing...
Rage and tears followed the murder of Nia Wilson, an 18-year old Black woman from Oakland, who was killed while exiting a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train one Sunday evening in July. These were appropriate reactions in the wake of such a tragedy, especially from community members incensed by the seemingly relentless targeted killing of Black people across the nation by police and racist vigilantes. But there were inappropriate responses as well. Among the worst of these came from BART authorities that responded with a proposal for widely expanding transit surveillance. One BART policymaker went as far as to call for the widespread use of facial recognition technology. Let’s be clear: expanded surveillance and facial recognition technology are not the solution. Would these technologies have prevented Nia Wilson’s murder? No. Instead of preventing race-based hate crimes, expanded surveillance will just put more people of color at risk, adding insult to injury, salt to an open...
Thanks to the magic of a free and open Internet and social networking, this generation has the ability to document every day of their entire lives. On the flip side, once posted there’s no way to erase the occasional stupid comment, regretful photo or random rookie mistake…or, is there? Photo: Giphy As co-founder of On Second Thought , Maci Peterson has patented a system that allows users to recall and edit their messages in real time. The inspiration came to the 30-year-old entrepreneur three years ago, when she accidentally texted an ex-boyfriend something she later wished she could take back. I mean, who hasn’t been there? In 2014, that inspiration lead Peterson to launch an app used to recall text messages. Now she and her partner are taking it a step further and expanding the technology for use on social networking platforms. In fact, the patented recall system will be made available on all forms of telecommunications. Brilliance! No one deserves a permanent, easily sharable...