Chinese Authorities Pair Facial Recognition, Thermal Imaging to Contain Coronavirus: Report

“In China, facial recognition cameras, coupled with the state’s broader surveillance capabilities, allow authorities to immediately access citizen’s travel histories, potentially enhancing their ability to track and control the virus’s spread.”

Chinese authorities are now turning their massive apparatus of biometric surveillance to the containment of coronavirus, suggests a new report from Al Jazeera.

Details are scant, but the report claims that face-scanning cameras – which are increasingly preponderant across China, and can be used to identify citizens and even ticket them for jaywalking – are now being used together with infrared temperature scanners to see if individuals may potentially be infected. Al Jazeera reports that there are an estimated 350 million surveillance cameras spread throughout China, though it isn’t clear how many of these are now scanning body temperature.

This temperature-scanning twist on biometric identification was also recently seen in Thailand, where the German firm Dermalog recently deployed specialized camera systems at the border that could detect signs of fever in those being scanned – also a response to the spread of coronavirus.

In China, facial recognition cameras, coupled with the state’s broader surveillance capabilities, allow authorities to immediately access citizen’s travel histories, potentially enhancing their ability to track and control the virus’s spread.

China’s prolific use of facial recognition to surveil its population has caused global controversy – particularly with respect to alleged human rights violations concerning its Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang – and has even seen some modest pushback from within China, most notably in a recent privacy-focused lawsuit. But with the technology now being used to help address the coronavirus crisis, it would seem unlikely that government authorities will shy away from it going forward.

Source: Al Jazeera

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February 24, 2020 – by Alex Perala