Huawei ‘heads-up’ CCTV facial recognition in Uganda.

According to a report in the South China Morning Post, Huawei is rolling out a major facial recognition CCTV system in Uganda. Apparently a burgeoning crime wave is making it very difficult for police to cope unless it has the technology, at least that was said in response to a suggestion that Huawei technicians had helped intelligence officials in Uganda to spy on their political opponents.

Readers may also remember Huawei as a supplier of telecommunications equipment. The US asserts that it’s technology poses a security risk and advises against the use of it.

In another development CloudWalk (a Chinese AI company) has signed a deal with the government of Zimbabwe to help build a mass facial recognition system. Apparently the capture of diverse ethnicity images will help to improve the accuracy of its recognition engine and thus improve surveillance technologies. It supplies such technology to the Chinese police amongst others.

I shall leave the reader to judge the spin-off benefits that the use of these systems gives to those in power.

Back in China again, an AI facial recognition system wrapped in on-line credit application software detected that a video required for the account set-up was not of a living person but of a still image , additionally voice recognition software detected the wrong sex. Apparently the software requires the applicant to blink as well as talk. A flag was raised and further analysis of the image revealed bruising around the neck. Police were informed and they apprehended the applicant in the process of burning the body of his strangled girlfriend. As you have probably perceived, the loan account application was in the name of the girlfriend and the image used was of her face but he had to use his own voice.

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