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Czech police forced to turn off facial recognition cameras at the Prague airport

160 points| campuscodi | 5 months ago |edri.org | reply

53 comments

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[+] FridayoLeary|5 months ago|reply
I assumed that every airport does it as a matter of policy. A border guard in the UK told me the reason they don't bother checking your passport when you leave is because they check your face on camera.

In this case it seems like a legitimate use of facial recognition: catching criminals. The story is of interest to me because i've been through the airport many times. I guess they have a picture of me.

ot but in many European airports i've been to they have those clunky face scanning machines and after that proper passport controls. I've discovered that in some places i can skip them and get my passport stamped with no issues.

[+] alexanderchr|5 months ago|reply
Border guard was wrong. UK used passenger records from transport companies to determine when someone left the country, not face recognition.

They do however use face recognition when you take a domestic flight from an international terminal. Then they take a photo of you just before security and compare that when you board. To me this seems like an overly complex solution to a problem that would normally by solved by having a domestic section of the terminal, but I’m sure they had their reasons.

[+] SoftTalker|5 months ago|reply
Last time I came into the USA from Europe they never checked my passport. They know who is on each arriving flight and match faces to passport records.
[+] hacka22|5 months ago|reply
this is great news and I wonder if and how this has impact on other European deployments
[+] analog8374|5 months ago|reply
We're preferring ignorance to knowledge here because we don't trust the government. Which is weird.
[+] aerostable_slug|5 months ago|reply
Sure to result in a surge of ticket sales as clandestine intelligence operatives pivot to Czechia as their flight hub of choice. /s
[+] octoberfranklin|5 months ago|reply
Nah, they still have Vienna.

But seriously I don't think you can fly direct from the US to Prague. You're gonna get face-scanned in Heathrow or some other transit airport.

But I am once again impressed with the Czechs. They get it.

[+] whatpeoplewant|5 months ago|reply

[deleted]

[+] Ziomislaw|5 months ago|reply
and who would verify that the system had not been modified and is being used in accordance with the law? pinky promise is not enough.

police forces in most (EU but not only) countries had proven multiple times that they think the law does not apply to them. they will always abuse such systems.

[+] ewuhic|5 months ago|reply
This account posts AI slop, please flag it.
[+] oddmade|5 months ago|reply
So much ignorance in this thread.

Quite staggering considering this is HN.

If you're upset by security vs privacy at airports - don't Google how cell phones and credit cards work...

..and for the love of sanity - don't ask yourself how often you did not bring a phone and only used cash during a trip abroad.

Good luck. Make sure you take your meds.

..if by any chance you DO want to educate yourself - the reality is - removal of airport security only benefits criminals and mad people looking to hurt you.

Privacy battles are fought elsewhere.

[+] 3oil3|5 months ago|reply
great example, there are like 50% of people that share yours point of view on the subject (cameras not bad), and another 50% who have the strict opposit opinion (cameras not good).

And each is usually hard to convince otherwise, and many judge the opposit group.

Me I dont care, I just want cheaper bottles of water in airport.

[+] 3oil3|5 months ago|reply
It's interesting how we can all have such opposit judgments while sharing roughly the same education/experiences, and that it usually falls into a 50/50 share. I think an automated system to identify criminals in the most likely 'points of exit' is quite remarkable. I know that throughout history government have not really been so gentle, but that's an anoher topic -we get the governments we deserve. On the other hand, it would be nice to have something in return, like no more check-ins or something, and for the love of all that is love, maybe lessen this silly security check - take off my shoes? check my bag with a $50000 mass spectrometer to see if if there is powder? have any of these machine ever detected something anywhere in the world? How about less hypocrisy and tell us about that super elastic relation between 'time spent' and '$ spent" is? I disgressed, but that's what annoys me, that a place where people are arbitrarly prohibited from bringing water, has criminally-inflated prices for a bottle of water -even if I'v been blessed so that I have them for free in the lounge. That's what I think is a problem. Not cameras.
[+] gramie|5 months ago|reply
I travelled from Australia to Malaysia to Canada (with a stopover in Dubai), and all the time I had 2 1/2 bottles of water (probably 1.5 litres) in my carry-on bag that I had forgotten. Something about a 46-hour journey, perhaps.

I went through 8 security gates, and no one ever stopped or questioned me about the water. And when I found it at my destination, I threw it out.