Some cops already have the ability to extract data from your cell phone using handheld forensic devices, but soon police officers will have a new mobile data collection toy to play with—an Apple iPhone. Actually, it's an iPhone-based device that connects directly to the back of an iPhone, which is designed to give law enforcement an accurate and immediate identification of a suspect based on their facial features, fingerprints and even their eyes.
The device that attaches to the iPhone is called MORIS, designed by biometric innovator BI2 Technologies. It stands for Mobile Offender Recognition and Information System, and has a built-in fingerprint scanner and utilizes the iPhone's camera to take photos of people's faces and irides so that its facial and iris recognition software can find and pull up any criminal records that exist.
To scan a fingerprint, the officer just needs to have the person in question place his or her fingertip on the small rectangular scanner and the software does its work, searching the national database for matches.
In order to identify someone via the facial recognition software, the officer needs to take a photo of the person from a distance of two to five feet away. The system analyzes roughly 130 distinguishing points on the face, such as the distance between the eye and nose or the contour of the eye sockets. It then scans the national database for matches.
For iris detection, the officer would hold MORIS's special iris-scanning camera about five to six inches away from one of the person's irises. After snapping the high-resolution photograph, the system analyzes over 200 unique features in the iris and uses a sophisticated algorithm to match the suspect in their database.
Mainly, MORIS will be used by police officers to identify individuals they've stopped who aren't carrying any form of identification, as well as accident victims and homeless people. Before MORIS, cops would take photos of people's faces with digital cameras, download the images to laptops, then use facial recognition technology to search for a face match. MORIS speeds the process up tenfold.
And if you think this is some sort of invasion of privacy or against your rights as a citizen of this country, then think again. Though deputies are required to ask permission before taking photos or fingerprint scans, legally, they don't have to. But what if this device was used not only for scanning and matching, but for scanning and storing your information into the national database? It could update your image or iris in the database, as well as add yours if you're not already in the system.
The device that attaches to the iPhone is called MORIS, designed by biometric innovator BI2 Technologies. It stands for Mobile Offender Recognition and Information System, and has a built-in fingerprint scanner and utilizes the iPhone's camera to take photos of people's faces and irides so that its facial and iris recognition software can find and pull up any criminal records that exist.
To scan a fingerprint, the officer just needs to have the person in question place his or her fingertip on the small rectangular scanner and the software does its work, searching the national database for matches.
In order to identify someone via the facial recognition software, the officer needs to take a photo of the person from a distance of two to five feet away. The system analyzes roughly 130 distinguishing points on the face, such as the distance between the eye and nose or the contour of the eye sockets. It then scans the national database for matches.
For iris detection, the officer would hold MORIS's special iris-scanning camera about five to six inches away from one of the person's irises. After snapping the high-resolution photograph, the system analyzes over 200 unique features in the iris and uses a sophisticated algorithm to match the suspect in their database.
Mainly, MORIS will be used by police officers to identify individuals they've stopped who aren't carrying any form of identification, as well as accident victims and homeless people. Before MORIS, cops would take photos of people's faces with digital cameras, download the images to laptops, then use facial recognition technology to search for a face match. MORIS speeds the process up tenfold.
And if you think this is some sort of invasion of privacy or against your rights as a citizen of this country, then think again. Though deputies are required to ask permission before taking photos or fingerprint scans, legally, they don't have to. But what if this device was used not only for scanning and matching, but for scanning and storing your information into the national database? It could update your image or iris in the database, as well as add yours if you're not already in the system.
What the judges said: "The consumerisation of business devices continues apace - the BlackBerry is the business device of yesteryear."
