1 million riot photos sent to police

cbc.ca

7 points·rajpaul··5 comments

One interesting morsel of info also came to light. ICBC; the BC crown corporation that issues drivers licenses has come forward and offered its photos database and facial recognition technology to the Vancouver Police. Allowing them to ID the people in these 1 million photos if they have a BC drivers license or BC ID. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2011/06...

As someone who lives in BC, I like the idea of getting these vandals, but it is also a little scary to have a tool like this. One of the first cases I've ever heard of.

If it works, I would be blown away. I was at the riot, and my first thought was that the rioters were making a big mistake because of the large number of people taking pictures. The police likely have multiple pictures, from different angles of many incidents.

Here is something else that might scare you a little bit, a 2,110 mega pixel zoomable image of the crowd: http://www.gigapixel.com/image/gigatag-canucks-g7.html

I'm torn on this. On one hand, screw all the rioters. On the other hand, what exactly will they do with these pictures? The second shows a guy with his arm around his friend, holding a bottle of soda in the other hand. His face is uncovered, his friend's covered. Will he be brought in just for being in the vicinity? Who knows what kind of database is being built from these pictures and how some random picture might affect this guy's future when maybe he was just helping his friend.

My feeling is that the guy with his arm around his friend has more to fear from over zealous citizens than form the authorities.

Upload the photos to facebook.

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