After the iPhone X: You're in an electronics store. You watch a few TVs and go home after being recorded by the store's cameras.
This data is then cross-referenced with other databases that already contain your facial data. Your face is now the focus of a very specifically targeted campaign.
For example, your smart TV with a camera already recognizes your face, and could now help serve you ads for the exact new TV you're considering, since the store cameras you were in before caught you looking at it with interest.
If the TV is different from the one you use at home, you might never see that ad.
You don't have to register or consent, you just have to have a face and be as indifferent as the rest of us to the terms of use.
This is not some scenario that will happen in the distant future. It could become a reality within a few months.
Apple introduced facial recognition capabilities with the iPhone X, which is coming next month.
Apple will use your facial data to unlock a device (iPhone X), but also to display cute "animojis", animated emoji faces whose movements track your facial movements.
Apple , not in the cloud, but the terms of service are subject to change. And Apple won't be the only company to release a product with the self-restraint to not leverage our facial data.
There are companies that have been playing around with the face for a while now, using your facial data to create some kind of prank or some kind of illusion. Every time your facial data is stored, there is the possibility of processing it based on machine learning through some AI.
So what will be the consequences of leaking your personal data?
Facebook alone has 1.2 billion faces scanned, stored and identified, according to the Economist. Facebook users in return have the convenience of automatic tagging, but their faces are used as yet another data item in Facebook’s revenue toolbox.
Did you ever actually read those terms and conditions? Animojis could come later, along with various beauty filters. By using our boundless narcissism, Facebook could create more precise marketing, with more precise distinctions.
What if all the digital cameras outside our homes used hi-def cameras to recognize people on the street?
Mass numbers of people could be identified by cameras to pinpoint the products they own: 30 percent bought a particular car, 15 percent own winter boots, and so on.
Like it or not, this technology is not going backwards. Will businesses say no? Of course not, but they will have to use the technology responsibly and maintain some degree of trust in the consumer. The No. 1 pillar for building relationships between customers and companies is trust. It can take years to build and seconds to destroy.
So if tomorrow or the day after tomorrow there are some people who are thinking of using this particular technology, they should be honest with the terms of use, store the data securely, and also disclose that they are doing so.
Of course, all of the above also applies today to other types of information-data collected by companies, and we have seen that this does not always happen.
This time, however, we are talking about data that precisely identifies us, and not about a password and a pseudonym.
