# LAPD Uses Face Recognition Technology



## kwflatbed (Dec 29, 2004)

http://www.officer.com/article/article.jsp?id=31230&siteSection=1



IBS/KNBC
*The LAPD is now using ultra-high-tech face recognition devices to fight crime.*










KNBC










KNBC

*Story by nbc4.tv*

The Los Angeles Police Department is now using ultra-high-tech face recognition devices to fight crime in southeast Los Angeles. NBC4's Kelly Mack explains that there are those who worry about the privacy issues involved.

_Images _| _Video _

KELLY MACK: Detective Damien Levesque of the LAPD shows the old-fashioned mug shot books the force has been using for decades. But now, all of these photos that police say are of known gang members and criminal suspects are available to officers in the field in the form of a high tech mobile identifier.

DETECTIVE DAMIEN LEVESQUE, LAPD: It's comprised of a data set of images that we take from all of our mug books and actually put them in a digital format and provide them to the officer so they can go out and make real time, informed decisions in a timely manner.

MACK: This is how it works. If I'm the suspect a police officer uses the mobile identifier to take a digital picture of me and immediately the 36 closest matches in the database are displayed on the small screen.

LEVESQUE: Say you resembled someone in the first three. I can then select on someone in the first three and pull up a side by side.

MACK: Clearly, in this case, the closest matching mug shot (pictured on tape) is not I, so I am therefore eliminated as a suspect.

The mobile identifier was developed by Nevin Vision of Santa Monica using software that goes far beyond biometrics.

HARTMUT NEVIN, NEVIN VISION: We go a step deeper. We look at the skin texture and essentially use a tapestry of your skin to compare against database pictures.

In the next stage we will use information in the iris pattern. So it will be iris, skin, and face recognition combined all on one single high-resolution image shot.

MACK: The LAPD is now using the mobile identifiers in the Jordan Downs housing project in Southeast LA. This is where a gang injunction is in effect. The devices were used in a pilot program at the LAPD's Rampart Division, apparently to great effect.

LEVESQUE: We initially targeted the members of the gang ms that were included in the injunction. During a six to eight month pilot program we made over 60 arrests that were predominantly of ms gang members.

MACK: But there are those who worry that the technology is not perfect and will therefore ensnare innocent people.

JENNIFER URBAN, USC PROFESSOR OF LAW: a very small numerical error rate could pose quite an issue for actual, individual people if we are talking about something as profound as whether or not someone is chosen for arrest.

MACK: The makers of the device counter that argument with this:

NEVEN: The software doesn't replace human decision-making, it assists human decision-making.

LEVESQUE: If you're not wanted, if you're not someone who has been listed in a gang injunction, you're not wanted for any other pending violation, you're not going to get in the device.

The LAPD hopes to use mobile identifiers throughout the city.

Copyright 2006 by NBC4.tv. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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