The new IARPA (Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity) program aims to create biometric technology that allows people to be identified using cameras mounted on remote rooftops and drones.
IARPA is reportedly working to create biometric identification systems that can identify and recognize people at distances of hundreds of meters or more, which is nearly impossible with today's technology.
Ultimately, the technology will allow spy agencies to quickly identify people using cameras mounted very remotely on rooftops and on drones.
Facial recognition and other forms of biometric technology have improved significantly in recent years, but even the most advanced systems today are becoming less reliable without a crystal clear view of the subject. Even when a person is standing nearby and looking directly into the camera, face recognition technology can be error prone.
However, IARPA is trying to overcome these limitations in two ways: a) by collecting a larger database and b) by creating systems that use fundamentally different types of data to identify people.
On Friday, IARPA began seeking researchers to participate in a remote biometric recognition and identification project. The entire program is codenamed BRIAR and aims to develop identification tools that work with unprecedented resolution.
While the program is still evolving, the technology it seeks to develop could greatly enhance the government's ability to monitor both a potential adversary and its citizens.
“Further research into long-range biometric recognition and identification could significantly improve the protection of critical infrastructure and vehicles, the protection of the military and border security,” IARPA officials wrote in an Editors' request for information.
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Teams interested in participating in the program must respond by October 21st.
In a request for information, IARPA asked teams to provide a wide range of datasets that could help train biometric technologies to work in less than ideal conditions. Today, they said, the range of face recognition and other identification systems is limited due to a lack of training data, but more datasets will help researchers create more versatile and powerful tools.
Specifically, IARPA requested images of people captured from more than 300 meters away or with viewing angles above 20 degrees, as well as biometric survey datasets captured by drones and other aircraft.
In doing so, instead of relying on a single database, BRIAR also aims to study technologies that use different types of biometric identifiers, such as facial images, movement patterns, height, gender, and so on. Ultimately, building this composite view of an object allows the system to accurately identify people, even if certain pieces of data are far from perfect. In the request, IARPA asked the teams to provide any data that could help train the system in this kind of techniques.
“Pictures taken at long distance or at altitude may also require additional biometric signatures to be combined with facial recognition to provide the necessary accuracy or reliability for use in personal identification. Combining multiple biometric signatures to address these limitations remains an underestimated research community,”IARPA officials said.
As part of a separate research project, IARPA is also working to create artificial intelligence systems that can track people moving across wide video surveillance networks.
Editorial comment
In 2008, a sci-fi film "Eagle Eye", which is familiar to many of our readers, was released worldwide, which for some reason went to the Russian box office under the name "On the Hook" - apparently with the aim of attracting fans of hunting and fishing to watching. …
According to the plot of the film, the CIA / FBI built the above-described recognition system, connected Artificial Intelligence to it, which, after a little thought, decided that it was time to get rid of the biomass running around the two-legged sacks and urgently began to solve this problem.
Thus, if 10 years ago it was science fiction, in another ten years it will all be a soap opera and will firmly enter life. Therefore, whoever is interested in how this life will approximately look like, we recommend that you refresh this film in your memory and follow the development of IT events.
