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Activists build Their personal Facial reputation gadget to identity horrific cops who conceal badges


 “Beat them at their own game.” “Flip the script.” “Give them a taste of their own medicine.” Any of those phrases will apply to the absolutely ingenious measures taken by activists who are creating their own automatic face recognition systems to spot cops who hide their badges.

As reported during the George Floyd protests, across the country, in dozens of cities, cops were distributing unprecedented violence within the face of angry protests stemming from unchecked police brutality. Though Floyd’s death was the flashpoint of the unrest, the uprising represented something far deeper — systemic abuse by enforcement of minorities, the poor, and everybody else in some way connected to the establishment. Countless incidents throughout this unrest involved officers who couldn't be identified and as a result of their anonymous instigation and violence, there has been no accountability.

In multiple states, police are seemingly taking measures to avoid this accountability by removing their name tags or covering their badges. this can be in direct violation of most departments’ policies. But no politicians, mayors, governors, or mainstream media seem to worry.

Cops hiding their identification is ominous for 2 reasons. the primary reason being that they will enact brutality against the innocent and that we don't know who they're to carry them accountable. The second reason is that the incontrovertible fact that anyone can dress up sort of a cop with no badge number and begin doing whatever they need, up to and including inciting violence, detaining people, or the other numerous unscrupulous acts.

As we reported at the time, many of those departments looked as if it would are given orders from the highest all the way down to cover their badge numbers and take away their nameplates. this is often not acceptable and due to a self-taught programmer, Christopher Howell, it now not needs to be.

Howell created a program that identifies cops who were permitted by their supervisors to hide their names while responding to protests.

“I am committed developing biometric identification to after all use on Portland law enforcement officials since they're not identifying themselves to the general public,” Howell told the NY Times.

Because Portland made it illegal to use automatic face recognition against the police, Howell had some barriers to using his software. However, because the NY Times reports, Portland’s mayor, Ted Wheeler, told Mr. Howell that his project was “a little creepy,” but a lawyer for town clarified that the bills wouldn't apply to individuals. The Council then passed the legislation in a very unanimous vote.

“There’s plenty of excessive force here in Portland,” Howell told the NY Times. “Knowing who the officers appear to be a baseline.”

This self-taught programmer has since created a system that has led to flipping the script on police accountability.

“This was, you know, reasonably a ‘shower thought’ moment on behalf of me, and just quite an intersection of what I do know the way to do and what my current interests are,” he said. “Accountability is vitalwe'd like to grasp who is doing what, so we are able to cope with it.”

Howell isn't alone in his pursuit of identifying anonymous cops who can disbursed violence without concern of retribution.

Colin Cheung, a protester in the city, had developed a tool to spot law enforcement officials using online photos of them. His technology was so effective that the Chinese government arrested him for it.

As the Times reports, Paolo Cirio published photos of 4,000 faces of French law enforcement officials online for an exhibit called “Capture,” which he described because of the opening move in developing a biometric identification app. He collected the faces from 1,000 photos he had gathered from the net and from photographers who attended protests in France.

Other folks are becoming onboard moreover. If the state is willing to use biometric identification on innocent citizens, they shouldn’t be surprised with the cameras and software begin pointing back at them.

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