Juggalos: The Secret to Evading Facial Recognition Technology
Does the fact that the world is slowly but surely turning into Minority Report have you down?
Don’t be so glum, chum! It turns out there is a relatively easy solution: you just have to be a juggalo! (Or at least be willing to wear clown makeup on a regular basis.) Yahoo reports that “One Twitter user, @tahkion, a computer science blogger for WonderHowTo, has discovered that [juggalo] makeup is the foil to facial recognition technology.”
Apparently, the black part of the traditional juggalo-style makeup design totally throws off this technology’s ability to pinpoint specific areas of the face, such as the eyes and the nose.
i made a breakthrough. it turns out juggalo makeup defeats facial recognition successfully. if you want to avoid surveillance, become a juggalo i guess pic.twitter.com/kEh7fUQeXq
— tahkion (@tahkion) July 1, 2018
for anyone wondering why some face changes evade facial recognition and others don't, here's a visualization of how landmarks are placed on a few examples. juggalo makeup is particularly effective as it basically totally redefines what is interpreted as the jawline pic.twitter.com/dFSx5FEGc9
— tahkion (@tahkion) July 1, 2018
Unfortunately, this is not a 100% fool-proof strategy for defeating facial recognition software. For one thing, you’ll have to lead the world to believe that you are a fan of some of the worst music ever produced — and you can’t even try the same method in a theoretically “cooler” style, like corpse paint, because that doesn’t work. Also, Apple will still own your ass. From the Outline:
“Face-painting styles like ‘corpse’ makeup also obscure the face. However, they don’t create enough contrast to effectively confuse most facial recognition systems. Dramatic styles of feminine makeup, like heavy eyeliner, also are generally not enough to confuse facial recognition systems, @tahkion claims. However, facial recognition tech such as Apple’s Face ID, which does not rely on visible light and uses depth perception, would not be tricked by juggalo makeup (otherwise it would never work in the dark).”
Despite these drawbacks — and the fact that ICP will probably think their makeup fool the software is the result of a holy miracle — juggalos now have bragging rights: between this and the fact that the 2017 Million Juggalo March drew more supporters than a pro-Trump march taking place at the same time, ICP and their fans have now done more for political progressivism than black metal has. Don’t @ me.
[via Metal Hammer]
