Digital Barriers face recognition software provided for free to find missing youth

Digital Barriers will be providing its live facial recognition software, SmartVis Face, for free to all national and local authorities and agencies in the UK involved in the search for missing young people.

As featured in a July 20 episode of BBC Newsnight, SmartVis Face is the company’s new automatic facial recognition system that has been built around machine learning.

The software was initially designed to track criminals and terror suspects against watch lists of several thousands of people.

Last week, Digital Barriers released facial recognition system SmartVis Identifier, which the company said is intended for use in body worn law enforcement cameras.

The company said many people have inquired how SmartVis facial recognition can be used outside of crime-based law enforcement, such as in the search for missing young people passing through major towns and cities.

SmartVis Face is a non-conformant technology that works on standard cameras and hardware, including smartphones, which reduces costs and is unaffected by changing lighting and environmental conditions.

The technology can be used to match faces against lists of missing young people by targeting key public spaces such as railway and bus stations.

The system sends alerts informing relevant agencies and authorities when vulnerable young people are spotted walking through these locations.

Digital Barriers will also provide SmartVis for use on smartphones, enabling authorities to check vulnerable young people against lists of those who have been reported as missing.

“SmartVis facial recognition has been designed to significantly enhance the technology in use by law enforcement and security agencies in the fight against terrorism and serious crime,” said Zak Doffman, Digital Barriers CEO. “This same technology can also be used to combat the growing problem of missing and vulnerable young people passing through our towns and cities. Now we are making SmartVis facial recognition software freely available to UK agencies and authorities focusing on finding missing young people. If the agency or authority provides access to suitable cameras and PCs, we’ll do the rest.”

Doffman said that the company will also make smartphone licences freely available, as well as engage with the suppliers of cameras and processing hardware to convince them to donate equipment to aid in the search for young people.

The SmartVis Face technology is now available for use via standard smartphones, body-worn cameras and CCTV cameras.

Combined with Digital Barriers’ mobile live streaming solution, EdgeVis, it makes streaming from these devices both operationally and financially viable.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  Digital Barriers  |  facial recognition  |  law enforcement