Subject: DHS Wants a Single Search Engine to Flag Faces and Fingerprints Across Agencies
Source: WIRED
https://www.wired.com/story/dhs-wants-a-single-search-engine-to-flag-faces-and-fingerprints-across-agencies/
The agency is asking private biometric contractors how to build a unified platform that would let employees search faces and fingerprints across large government databases already filled with biometrics gathered in different contexts. The goal is to connect components including Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Transportation Security Administration, US Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Secret Service, and DHS headquarters, replacing a patchwork of tools that do not share data easily.The system would support watch-listing, detention, or removal operations and comes as DHS is pushing biometric surveillance far beyond ports of entry and into the hands of intelligence units and masked agents operating hundreds of miles from the border.
Both types of searches come with real technical limits. In identity checks, the systems are more sensitive, and so they are less likely to wrongly flag an innocent person. They will, however, fail to identify a match when the photo submitted is slightly blurry, angled, or outdated. For investigative searches, the cutoff is considerably lower, and while the system is more likely to include the right person somewhere in the results, it also produces many more false positives that necessitate human review.
The department also wants the system wired directly into its existing infrastructure. Contractors would be expected to connect the matcher to current biometric sensors, enrollment systems, and data repositories so information collected in one DHS component can be searched against records held by another.
It’s unclear how workable this is. Different DHS agencies have bought their biometric systems from different companies over many years. Each system turns a face or fingerprint into a string of numbers, but many are designed only to work with the specific software that created them.
At the scale DHS is proposing—potentially billions of records—even small compatibility gaps can spiral into large problems.
The Justice Department’s Criminal Resource Manual notes that most federal courts have ruled voiceprint evidence admissible, citing cases from the 1970s and ’80s, while also acknowledging that at least one federal appeals court found the technique inadmissible and that its scientific validity has remained in question since the Supreme Court’s 1993 decision in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals. Those questions have only intensified given the rise of AI systems capable of convincingly mimicking a person’s voice.
Jeff Migliozzi, who directs communications for the nonprofit Freedom for Immigrants, which runs the National Immigration Detention Hotline, said the expansion of DHS’s biometric infrastructure raises serious civil rights concerns.
- Department of Homeland Security
- Immigration and Customs Enforcement
- Customs and Border Protection
- immigration
- face recognition
- privacy
- surveillance
- biometrics
Source: Gizmodo
https://gizmodo.com/flock-cameras-have-a-people-love-smashing-them-problem-2000725063
People just aren’t being very nice to these mass surveillance devices.Flock cameras have become such attractive targets for destruction that some police have become protective of information about where they’re mounted. A local news story Friday in Louisville, Kentucky detailed the Louisville police’s effort to keep the locations secret.
On Saturday, Brian Merchant of the tech criticism newsletter Blood in the Machine catalogued a wider trend regarding Flock, the company famous for its networked, AI-enhanced, solar-powered license plate readers, video cameras, gunshot detectors, and “drone as first responder” tech: vandalism against Flock equipment is happening all over the country, seemingly without coordination.
Some other interesting facts about Flock: Its CEO Garrett Langley was 38 as of last September, and has indicated that he believes sufficiently widespread use of his mass surveillance technology, along with the deployment of his other ideas, can eliminate all crime in America. He has all sorts of ideas (Forgive people’s student debt if they become cops, for instance) and talked all about them two months ago on the YouTube channel of the VC firm Andreessen Horowitz. Andreessen Horowitz, by the way, has invested $275 million in Flock.
But if you’ve heard only one thing about Flock lately, it probably has something to do with Ring’s eerie Super Bowl commercial involving its since-aborted partnership with Flock.
“We respect and value concerns and feedback raised about our technology, and building trust is important to us. We are regularly on the ground in communities across the country answering questions and providing education on what our technology does and does not do.”
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Subject: Anti-Peeping Screens Coming to Chinese Flagship Phones This September
Source: Android Headlines
https://www.androidheadlines.com/2026/02/anti-peeping-screens-coming-to-chinese-flagship-phones-this-september.html
Chinese smartphone manufacturers will begin adopting hardware-level anti-peeping screen technology in September, similar to the upcoming Privacy Display feature on the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra. Initially expected on flagship devices, the tech limits screen visibility from side angles to protect sensitive information and will likely include software controls to enable, disable, or customize it by app….
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Subject: Scammers use fake “Gemini” AI chatbot to sell fake “Google Coin”
Source: Malwarebytes
https://www.malwarebytes.com/blog/ai/2026/02/scammers-use-fake-gemini-ai-chatbot-to-sell-fake-google-coin
Scammers have found a new use for AI: creating custom chatbots posing as real AI assistants to pressure victims into buying worthless cryptocurrencies.We recently came across a live “Google Coin” presale site featuring a chatbot that claimed to be Google’s Gemini AI assistant. The bot guided visitors through a polished sales pitch, answered their questions about investment, projecting returns, and ultimately ended with victims sending an irreversible crypto payment to the scammers.Google does not have a cryptocurrency. But as “Google Coin” has appeared before in scams, anyone checking it out might think it’s real. And the chatbot was very convincing.
AI chatbots on scam sites will become more common. Here’s how to spot them:…
How to protect yourself – Google does not have a cryptocurrency. It has not launched a presale. And its Gemini AI is not operating as a sales assistant on third-party crypto sites. If you encounter anything suggesting otherwise, close the tab.
Subject: Meta Employee Shares OpenClaw Email-Deletion Nightmare
Source: Business Insider
https://www.businessinsider.com/meta-ai-alignment-director-openclaw-email-deletion-2026-2
- Meta’s alignment director, Summer Yue, hooked OpenClaw up to her inbox. Then, the bot tried to delete her emails.
- “I had to RUN to my Mac mini like I was defusing a bomb,” Yue wrote on X.
- Some critics questioned why an AI safety researcher used OpenClaw at all. The buzzy project has drawn security concerns.
Yue had previously tried OpenClaw on her “toy inbox,” where she wrote that the bot worked well and gained her trust. Testing it on her “real inbox,” the bot had to compact a much larger set of emails. She instructed it not to take action without approval, but OpenClaw lost the prompt during compaction, she wrote.
Unlike other AI agents, OpenClaw does not need human approval to sign off on actions. It was also vibe-coded, and that combined with OpenClaw’s level of system access has led some AI researchers to question the bot’s security. AI researcher Gary Marcus told Business Insider that it was like “giving full access to your computer and all your passwords to a guy you met at a bar who says he can help you out.”
Source: Android Headlines
https://www.androidheadlines.com/2026/02/linkedin-id-verification-data-will-likely-be-shared-with-third-parties.html
LinkedIn ID verification data will reportedly be shared with third parties, one of which is said to be Persona, a company linked to Palantir co-creator Peter Thiel, and was previously being used by Discord for its age verification until the link was discovered.
Age verification data is potentially unsafe if you share your ID with LinkedIn, as new reports claim that LinkedIn is using Persona, the software that has ties to Palantir co-creator Peter Thiel. Persona uses ID verification data to compare with government watchlist photos. The concern is that uploading your ID to LinkedIn for age verification is going to lead to that ID information being shared with Persona, which can then share it with other outside entities.
Based on this possibility alone, it might not be the best idea to upload your ID information just to get profile verification. Doing so might mean that your information ends up in the hands of several organizations that you don’t want to have it. This comes several months after concerns about LinkedIn reportedly using your data to train AI, although this was opt-out and not required.
Source: 404 Media
https://www.bespacific.com/this-app-warns-you-if-someone-is-wearing-smart-glasses-nearby/
404 Media [no paywall] – The creator of Nearby Glasses made the app after reading 404 Media’s coverage of how people are using Meta’s Ray-Bans smartglasses to film people without their knowledge or consent: “A new hobbyist developed app warns if people nearby may be wearing smart glasses, such as Meta’s Ray-Ban glasses, which stalkers and harassers have repeatedly used to film people without their knowledge or consent. The app scans for smart glasses’ distinctive Bluetooth signatures and sends a push alert if it detects a potential pair of glasses in the local area. The app comes as companies such as Meta continue to add AI-powered features to their glasses. Earlier this month The New York Times reported Meta was working on adding facial recognition to its smart glasses. “Name Tag,” as the feature is called, would let smart glasses wearers identify people and get information about them from Meta’s AI assistant, the report said. “I consider it to be a tiny part of resistance against surveillance tech,” Yves Jeanrenaud, the hobbyist developer and sociologist who made the app, told 404 Media. To use the app, called Nearby Glasses, users download it from the Google Play Store or GitHub..
Source: Mozilla Blog
https://blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/ai-controls/
AI is changing the web, and people want very different things from it. We’ve heard from many who want nothing to do with AI. We’ve also heard from others who want AI tools that are genuinely useful. Listening to our community, alongside our ongoing commitment to offer choice, led us to build AI controls.Starting with Firefox 148, which rolls out on Feb. 24, you’ll find a new AI controls section within the desktop browser settings. It provides a single place to block current and future generative AI features in Firefox. You can also review and manage individual AI features if you choose to use them. This lets you use Firefox without AI while we continue to build AI features for those who want them.
One place to manage your AI preferences..
Firefox offers AI features to enhance everyday browsing. These features are optional, and they’re easy to turn on or off. – see also: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-ai-controls
[…]
Other features and where to configure them – The AI Controls do not include some Firefox features that rely on traditional machine learning, as well as features that are controlled by third parties. This includes the sites you can visit and the search engines you choose to use. You can learn more and manage these features using the settings and help articles linked below.
- Search features: Manage search engines and search-related features, including tools like Google Lens and search providers such as Perplexity.
- Address bar suggestions: Control what appears when you type in the address bar, including Firefox Suggest, history, bookmarks, and semantic search behavior.
- New Tab personalization: Review and adjust personalized content, recommendations, and sponsored content on the New Tab page.
Subject: How to know if an AirTag is tracking you
Source: engadget
https://www.bespacific.com/how-to-know-if-an-airtag-is-tracking-you/
engadget – “Apple’s AirTag is designed to help people keep track of personal belongings like keys, bags and luggage. But because AirTags and other Bluetooth trackers are small and discreet, concerns about unwanted tracking are understandable. Apple has spent years building safeguards into the AirTag and the Find My network to reduce the risk of misuse and to alert people if a tracker they don’t own appears to be moving with them. If you’re worried about whether an AirTag or similar tracker might be following you, here’s how Apple’s unwanted tracking alerts work, what notifications to look for and what you can do on both iPhone and Android…”
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Abstracted from beSpacific
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Source: PopSci
https://www.bespacific.com/the-archivist-preserving-decaying-floppy-disks/PopSci –
It’s a race against time (and magnetic decay) to preserve decades of cultural history stored on obsolete hardware: “Few nostalgic artifacts capture the spirit of the early personal computing era as clearly as the humble floppy disk.
But recovering all that data stored on the floppies is far more complicated than simply plugging in an old drive. Floppy disks came in various sizes and dozens of incompatible formats. And as the hardware capable of reading them fails and disappears, some warn that vast amounts of early digital history could slip into a “Digital Dark Age.” Leontien Talboom, an archivist at Cambridge University Library, has spent the past several years working to keep that from happening.
…
Copyright © 2025 beSpacific, All rights reserved.