Suprising! Facebook Can Now Recognize Your Face

Tagging has always been a controversial Facebook feature. When originally introduced, it was beloved—waking up Sunday morning to tag notifications meant you had a great weekend and there was documented evidence. But very quickly we all realized that perhaps photos of our faces weren’t always a good thing.

In fact, the fact that Facebook’s engine was learning what we looked like and could suggest inserting our identity into images came with some consequences. The scope of Facebook’s facial-recognition abilities has been growing, and fast.

This week, it was revealed that the network can identify you by far more than just your face. According to New Scientist, Facebook’s artificial intelligence lab is working on an algorithm that can identify people even if their faces are hidden. Things like your hair, your clothes, your body shape, and beyond can give you away. It’s astounding technology, but we don’t all want to be so recognizable. Just two weeks ago, talks in the E.U. to determine a code of conduct for companies using facial recognition fell apart.

The representatives and advocates involved in the process announced they “decided to withdraw from further negotiations” because compromise could not be found. Facebook’s newest app Moments, which uses facial recognition to help you share photos with friends, is not available in Europe because of its current policy. Interestingly, you can tell Facebook not to allow anyone to tag you in photos, as well as ask it not to suggest your name to your friends when they’re doing so, but there are people who are taking more thorough measures to maintain their identity independence.

Down below is the proof of what facebook accepts.  Check yourself

How does Facebook suggest tags?

When someone uploads a photo of you, we might suggest that they tag you in it. We're able to compare your friend's photos to information we've put together from your profile pictures and the other photos you're tagged in. If this feature is turned on for you, you can choose whether or not we suggest your name when people upload photos of you. Adjust this in your Timeline and Tagging settings.

We currently use facial recognition software that uses an algorithm to calculate a unique number (“template”) based on someone’s facial features, like the distance between the eyes, nose and ears. This template is based on your profile pictures and photos you’ve been tagged in on Facebook. We use these templates to help you tag photos by suggesting tags of your friends. If you remove a tag from a photo, that photo is not used to create the template for person whose tag was removed. We also couldn’t use a template to recreate an image of you.

More than ever, as Facebook’s system evolves and can identify you beyond your face, the solution for those trying to avoid it is also to evolve. You could dye your hair, vary your wardrobe, consider large tattoos and/piercings. But even that can only protect you so far—there are other factors that help Facebook’s facial recognition systems, namely your metadata. “Social metadata will greatly enhance any type of biometric recognition, especially on Facebook.

Conclude yourself what they are planning to do?