Cities razed to the ground, streets and sidewalks full of corpses and moments of everyday life suddenly annihilated. Images that came from Bucha, Mariupol and many other Ukrainian cities thanks to the work of reporters, but also through new technologies. Satellites, drones and open sources like photos, videos and social media posts available to everyone. In what is told as the most social war ever, facial recognition has also been added and the protagonist is Hoan Ton-That, the CEO of Clearview AI.
How can this technology be useful in warfare?
The algorithm will allow Ukrainians to identify captured Russian soldiers. To do this you just need a photo. The country’s Ministry of Defense accepted the offer from Clearview AI, which made its facial recognition system available to counter the Russian invasion.
But what are the risks behind this offer?
Hoan Ton-That’s company is known for illicit processing of biometric and geo-location data, collected with datascraping and sold to police forces and private companies. Also in Italy on March 9 the startup was fined 20 million by the Privacy Guarantor who also prohibited it from collecting further information on Italian citizens.
As we read in the New York Times, “Clearview is free in Ukraine and in less than a month more than 200 accounts have been created that have already conducted more than 5,000 searches”. This technology is useful for finding spies, for learning the real identity of Russian soldiers and for informing families “of the high cost of the conflict” as said by the Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.
But some argue that tech companies could take advantage of a crisis to expand with little control and at the expense of user privacy. The same company, which said it has a database of over 10 billion images of people’s faces, is facing lawsuits across Europe.
“American internet companies have allowed a virus of lies to infect each of us, pitting us against each other, exposing our fears, anger and hatred, and setting the stage for the rise of authoritarians and dictators. all over the world, ”said Filipino journalist Maria Ressa during her Nobel Peace Prize.
Launching such controversial software in a war zone can increase the risk of future abuse, which is more difficult to track and understand. At the moment, the only clear thing is that facial recognition is being used in Ukraine to identify Russian soldiers.