» Cameras in Żabka record and recognize customers' faces. Not only in Żabka and not only faces... -- Niebezpiecznik.pl --
Na Wykopie, jono posted a photo from his trip to the Żabka store. The photo shows the computer screen at the checkout, on which the store application has not yet started. However, another application was visible, showing the recording from the camera directed at the customer's face - next to the face there was a graph and a window with information about the alleged gender and age of the person captured by the camera.
The camera at the cash register in Żabka assesses age and gender. According to jono, the author of the photo, the camera is in a barcode reader
We are not surprised that some of you were terrified at such a sight. Today, e.g. thanks to Snowden, there is a lot of talk about surveillance, and the imagination in such situations suggests various scenarios. Especially since for some it is still unimaginable that a computer can recognize gender or age from a photograph. Anyway, the author of the photo himself suggested in his entry that Żabka creates customer profiles with their personal data. But this is probably (fortunately!) too far-reaching conclusion (so far) ... Żabka has not implemented the Facedeals project, which we wrote about a few years ago in the article entitled Facedeals - A camera that recognizes your face and checks your Facebook history.
Żabka explains
Żabka Polska has already published a statement which shows that the system shown in the photo is a test system (present in some stores) and, contrary to appearances, it is not used to create profiles of individual customers.
Żabka Polska believes that there is no violation of personal data protection rights, and Żabka customers can be sure that their right to shop anonymously has not been violated (admit ... you never thought that someone would discuss such a " almost").
There is no reason not to trust Żabka (especially considering what we will write in the following paragraphs of this text - that shopkeepers are not interested in the appearance of customers, but in general, "anonymous", global statistics about who the customer is). However, we understand that some people find it difficult to trust Żabka's words - after all, every person with basic knowledge of IT knows how easy it is to combine and correlate data from various systems (e.g. cash registers or payment terminals), and every person with basic knowledge of trade he knows what a temptation it is for marketers…
That's not all supermarkets do to "spy" on customers
And it's not just Żabka who is "to blame". Many chains in Poland and abroad use various technologies that are designed to illustrate who, what and where they most willingly download from the shelf. Retailers use these (not so cheap) systems to “optimize” their sales:
Apart from tracking the movements of customers in the store by cameras, the stores have access to surveillance using mobile identifiers. These can be IMSI numbers - then the store puts the so-called femtocels, which intercept phone calls and connect them to the GSM operator's network - we wrote about it extensively in the article entitled The supermarket is tracking you on your cell phone. The MAC numbers of Wi-Fi cards built into smartphones can also be used to track mobile phones, cf. This trash can is tracking you, this plug in the wall is eavesdropping.
It happens that Bluetooth is also used, but few phones use this protocol as advertisers/marketers would like. Wi-Fi, for iPhone owners, also makes less and less sense for marketers due to Apple's privacy changes.Visualizing smartphone traffic in London
Based on the signal from the phone, it is possible to precisely determine the path between the shelves that individual people move - where they stop, at what times they visit the store. If a mobile identifier anonymous to the store pays for its purchases with a payment card, the store may assign the customer's identity (name and surname) to the mobile identifier. At the next visit, the customer's profile will be expanded with subsequent (repetitive?) paths and purchases.
CreepyDOL in action
Bah! The store can also read Wi-Fi networks for which the customer's phone asks (regularly). And these are the networks that the phone has recently connected to. Based on this, the store can determine which district has the most customers (more precisely than asking for the zip code at the checkout). It is enough to correlate the obtained Wi-Fi network names with a database such as wigle.net or Apple or Google clouds used for geolocation based on SSID - cf. Change the name of the Wi-Fi network if you do not want Google to use it.
KARMA package, used to spy on devices using Wi-Fi in action
Well, now you know that you should hide not only from the cameras in stores (we especially recommend these anti-surveillance glasses or this clothes for cameras). If you want to remain completely anonymous, you cannot enter the store with your phone. Or pay with a card (and ideally, if you have an RFID card, don't bring it into the store at all - these anti-theft gates can read your unique "contactless" card number even if you don't use it to pay for purchases).
Finally, the last advice for those who wear dark glasses, with a mustache, without a phone or proximity cards, go to the store secretly to buy the last issue of the monthly Exorcist, Fakt, NIE or Gazeta Polska. Do not collect points on loyalty cards. "Acquiring" points when shopping binds the card ID with the shopping list and your profile. Tempted by the discounts of partner programs, customers are often not aware that there is nothing for free (cf. IKEA Family, cards at gas stations)…
The problem with monitoring is wider...
The entry on Wykop outraged many people, but before getting angry, it's worth realizing one thing - CCTV systems surround us from all sides and no one regulates it. Do you remember the tablet we recently described, which is used by postmen? Some of you were also concerned about the diode next to the camera that blinked when signing. In such a situation, the camera is easy to spot. But how many people know they are being recorded using an ATM? And who of you knows the exact number of cameras on which it is recorded every day on the way from home to work or to university?
Some city surveillance cameras don't bother and these people will always be their supporters ("monitoring increases security"). Opponents of the cameras, in turn, will point out that despite their presence, some cases still cannot be solved, despite the recording. Because either the image is not clear, or the camera was missing somewhere on the suspect's road, because it was not there or did not work (cf. the case of Ewa Tylman)
sometimes city surveillance cameras sometimes have a good effect on robbers:
Unfortunately, there is currently no law on video surveillance in Poland. The assumptions for such an act were created in 2013, but little came of it later. The current government or the Sejm do not show much interest in the subject either, although the Ombudsman reminded about the problem.
It is also worth mentioning that modern surveillance cameras do not always record the cloudy and gray image we know from TV reports. Some of them can have a great optical zoom (e.g. 20x), can react to movement and record FullHD images. In fact, no one prohibits combining these cameras with age, gender or behavior analysis software. Systems for evaluating customer behavior or detecting anomalies based on monitoring recordings have been available on the market for years (they support work at stations, airports and other places with a "crowd" at risk of terrorist attacks).
Recently, the Court of Appeal in Warsaw decided that recording neighbors with surveillance cameras may violate their personal rights (judgment of August 17, 2016, case file VI ACa 839/15). Unfortunately, in practice we often do not know when we are being recorded. State institutions and companies can refuse to provide public information about the number or capabilities of the cameras used. The neighbor, in turn, can record us "from behind the window".
If we think about all this, we will understand that the case of Żabka, which caused such widespread indignation, is not so shocking at all. Cameras and algorithms that use our image are already in use. We are also tracked by not-only-loyalty cards and mobile phones, not only by services and operators, but by ordinary companies. Only the "average Kowalski" does not realize this ...
If you want to protect yourself from surveillance, not only in the store and in the "real world", but also on the Internet, we recommend reading our article, which was created after the surveillance act was pushed through - How to defend yourself against being watched not only by the police and services.PS. In the neighborhood Żabka of one of the editors, there is a man in the parking lot who writes down the registrations of cars parked in front of the store. We do not know whether the eye does not judge the age, or God forbid the gender or tire tread depth. We also hope that the walkie-talkie that hangs from his waist is not a secret connection to the cash register, used to correlate the shopping list with a specific vehicle ...
