If you've got one of the newest smartphones, you've come into contact with facial recognition.
While facial recognition has been around for a long time, new technology advancements have meant it's had the ability to become a part of our everyday lives. Think about when you unlock your smartphone. You can now use your face...
Facial recognition is a way of recognizing a human face through technology. The facial recognition system will use biometrics to map a face from an image or video. Which it then compares against a database to identify the person.
These are the general steps of facial recognition:
Step one - A photo or video is captured that shows your face in a profile or nearly profile view.
Step two - You 'facial signature' is taken from the photo or video. This is done by recording facial landmarks - things like distance between eyes, the shape of your nose, and so on.
Step three - Your facial signature is then compared against a database to identify who you are. For example, with Sine's facial recognition, your photo is taken and added to the companies database. Then every time you try to check-in to a workplace, you can use your facial signature.
Step four - Your facial signature may or may not be identified depending on whether you're in the database. In the case of Sine, it would allow you to fast track the check-in process.
From using facial recognition in security to using it in visitor management systems, here are six ways companies are using facial recognition.
Facial recognition is being used in retail to identify known criminals as they enter stores. Photographs can be taken of people entering a store and compared to large criminal databases to identify who the person is.
In addition, store owners and security can be notified of the unwanted people as they entering.
Making the whole process automated and quick.
Facebook introduced a feature that instantly identified people in photos as they were uploaded. Making it much easier to tag your friends and for you to find photo's you were tagged in.
More recently, Facebook went a step further and released a feature that helped the blind find out who's in certain photos. It does this by voicing what is depicted in a photo including the people that it thinks might be in it.
While not specifically social media, Google has also jumped on board. You can now upload an image of a persons face and Google will give you all the image results for that persons face.
Schools are a place for learning and growing. A place where kids should never have to worry about feeling threatened or unsafe.
Facial recognition visitor management systems and security cameras can instantly identify when someone who shouldn't be on school grounds, is on school grounds. Giving school security the ability to act straight away.
This kind of visitor management system can then be integrated with features that can allow schools to instantly compare facial signatures to police records. Notifying school management if a person has a criminal record or more simply if they've been blacklisted from the school.
The same goes for large events, workplaces or anywhere where large amounts of people gather.
Checking into a workplace every time you go to one gets tedious and annoying. Now, companies are employing visitor management systems that can take control and streamline the whole process. Some of which integrate facial recognition to further improve the whole process.
If you sign into a workplace and have your photo taken for ID purposes, this image can be added to the companies database. Now, each time you check-in all you will have to do is show your face when prompted. The software will take care of the rest. Including, notifying the person you're there to see.
Cameras that have been placed in the ATMs are now being used as a facial recognition tool to ensure that the person trying to access a bank account is the person that should be.
Facial recognition was recently introduced to a select amount of ATMs in China and Spain. Allowing users to withdraw money from their accounts without using their cards. It's likely that this will be slowly introduced into other countries with an expectation to replace ATM cards.
If you're managing employees and contractors, you need to know when they're on site and when they've left. Facial recognition can help you do this by allowing them to check-in or clock-in using their face.
They're then automatically added to the check-in list, which gives administrators complete visibility.
There are hundreds of ways facial recognition is being used and that number is expected to grow as technologies advance and companies actively work to discover more innovative ways to use it.
