Tuesday, October 06, 2009
BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU SHOP
Business survaillence of customers is being implemented through the use of cameras in advertisments. Concerns over privacy have occurred, because of this advertisments are being looked at as the new form of big brother. New forms of personalized location advertising are emerging through the use of P.D.A.'s, cellphones, and car radios. Even bill boards you walk past on the street as well as in stores will now be watching. The billboards are supposed to have the power to detect what you are viewing. They will also be able to detect an individual's emotional reaction pertaining to its advertisement.
Face recognition technology is forming a more sophisticated device for public places. It's emotional detection is made possible through the use of recognition algorithms. First the billboard recognizes a human face, then it measures the distance between its features. Matches are then found in databases in under a second. This introduces a new era of target marketing.
Although amazing, some view this as a form of technological intrusion into privacy as well as an encroachment on civil liberties. Other claims state face, voice and behavior technology could be a means of tracking individuals over the coarse of an entire lifetime.
