Commonwealth Club Of California Podcast

Are you one in a million? One in a billion? What if an app could pick you out of a crowd based on your face alone?  New York Times tech reporter Kashmir Hill was skeptical when she got a tip about a mysterious app called Clearview AI that claimed it could, with 99 percent accuracy, identify anyone based on just one snapshot of their face. The app could supposedly scan a face and, in just seconds, surface every detail of a person’s online life: their name, social media profiles, friends and family members, home address, and photos that they might not have even known existed. If it was everything it claimed to be, it would be the ultimate surveillance tool, and it would open the door to everything from stalking to totalitarian state control. Could it be true? Hill tracked the improbable rise of Clearview AI and its astounding collection of billions of faces from the internet. Google and Facebook decided that a tool to identify strangers was too radical to release, but Clearview forged ahead, sharing the app wit