ken hanly wrote:
Video cameras on the lookout for terrorists
Monday, August 7, 2006; Posted: 2:52 p.m. EDT (18:52
GMT)
Researchers at General Electric Co.'s sprawling
research center, are creating new "smart video
surveillance" systems that can detect explosives by
recognizing the electromagnetic waves given off by
objects, even under clothing.
Sorry, anything that I'm aware of (a lot in re RF & EMF) that can detect
the level of EMR they are describing can readily be used to trigger an
explosive device. That includes MRIs, CTs, and X-ray. The "quadrupole
resonance" mentioned later in the article is simply a filtering scheme
to narrow the detection frequency down to the specific (closer
anyway...) frequency of resonance for different types of explosives...
nice, MORE concentrated energy at a specific frequency just makes it
that much easier to build a triggering device. I guess they figure it's
better to have human mush made at the gate instead of on-board. For some
reason I can't quite understand, the PR fallout is a lot worse when 100
people die in an aircraft crash compared to 100 people perishing at an
airline terminal.
The economic factors are obvious... better PR means less face-time with
the CEOs in the media, and it's much easier to do a forensic clean up in
an airline terminal, rather than bits and pieces of aircraft scattered
about the countryside
(..he said, desperately trying to stay on topic...)
.
Scientist Peter Tu and his team are also developing
programs that can recognize faces, pinpoint distress
in a crowd by honing in on erratic body movements and
synthesize the views of several cameras into one
bird's eye view, as part of a growing effort to thwart
terrorism.
"We're definitely on the cutting edge," said Tu, 39.
"If you want to reduce risk, video is the way to do
it. The threat is always evolving, so our video is
always evolving."
.
Short and sweet: The public is ALWAYS going to be the final "crash test
dummy" for this technology. We don't have to prove that it actually
works, because if it doesn't, we can just say that the public's furtive
motions have evolved and we have to crunch a new revision of our video
software.
A lot of money involved, but I'm not seeing any viable technology that
will ever operate correctly outside of a controlled laboratory environment.
Good investments (especially GE) though (..he said, desperately trying
to stay on topic...)
Leigh
http://leighm.net/
"The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree,
is by accident.
That's where we come in; we're computer professionals." - Nathaniel
Borenstein
