FaceID and the Future of AI
Apple unveiled its iPhone X with FaceID on September 12, 2017. As an engineer, I understand the internal logic by which FaceID came about.
- You want to provide the edge-to-edge screen
- You need to get rid of the Home button form under the glass (it didn’t work there anymore)
- You need to replace the ID functionality
There’s a front-facing camera already in place, and making your face an ID is a natural direction.
Various technical challenges that arise — distinct angles of view, changing facial hair or lighting or headgear — are catnip for Machine Learning scientists. Fraud with photos or masks is just another exhilarating challenge. All kinds of new things you can do, such as animoji, seem like a fun way to leverage the new capability.
I’m pretty sure nuclear scientists felt the same way — when you read Richard Feynman, you see how much fun and camaraderie was born around a joint technical task solved by the best young minds of a generation gathered in an elite, secret lab.
But with FaceID, human faces become a dataset for AI on a massive scale. This has never happened before. Inevitably, all kinds of uses will arise from this. Much better mining of emotions and identity will be possible. Correlating behavior with facial expressions will follow. Credit assessment based on your face, career decisions, marriage and dating will affect your own life. Your similarity with your children will lead to analysis of how they inherited your credit risks and career potential. Furthermore, one can ask whether the inherited credit risk is mainly from the mother or father?
Although the positive potential is immense, the dangers are enormous, too. Ethics will inevitably trail behind as abuses are invented and tried. Legal decisions will follow real-life consequences.
Where TouchID was an almost ease-of-use feature, where you can unlock the iPhone in your pocket or while driving, now you will have to constantly show your face to the phone. It will know when you’re sick, when you haven’t slept enough, or too long. It will know when you’re sad, happy, or just not here. Or rather, you will have to be here.
Look at me, Luke. I am your iPhone.
