{"id":110428,"date":"2014-03-28T19:10:31","date_gmt":"2014-03-28T19:10:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=110428"},"modified":"2014-03-28T19:10:31","modified_gmt":"2014-03-28T19:10:31","slug":"ibm-head-stop-fighting-embrace-total-biometric-surveillance-stopped","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/ibm-head-stop-fighting-embrace-total-biometric-surveillance-stopped\/","title":{"rendered":"IBM Head: Stop Fighting And \u201cEmbrace\u201d Total Biometric Surveillance Because It Cannot Be Stopped"},"content":{"rendered":"

Steve Watson<\/strong><\/p>\n

A leading IBM official has urged the world to \u201cembrace\u201d ubiquitous surveillance of the public through biometrics, because, he argues, it is too late to fight against it.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026trying to stop this would be fighting the wrong battle.\u201d\u00a0said Peter Waggett<\/a>, Programme Leader at IBM\u2019s Emerging Technology Group.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re fighting the wrong battle when we ask should we stop people being observed. That is not going to be feasible. We need to understand how to use that data better,\u201d Waggett added, speaking at a\u00a0Nesta<\/a>\u00a0panel debate on biometrics.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe information is out of the bottle already \u2013 we have to deal with the issues surrounding it now. Embrace the challenge of what we\u2019ve got, embrace understanding it and focus on what we can do with that new data.\u201d he argued, urging people to stop worrying about preventing such surveillance from becoming a societal norm.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4BtTpY2DFTQ<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been working in biometrics for 20 years, and it\u2019s reaching a tipping point where it\u2019s going to be impossible not to understand where people are and what they are doing. Everything will be monitored.\u201d Waggett continued.<\/p>\n

Alarming to privacy advocates, Waggett\u2019s words also carry more weight, given that he also heads the\u00a0BSI British Standards Biometrics Committee<\/a>\u00a0– a Royal Chartered group that is concerned with developing formal standards in the area of biometrics and promoting their use by government and industry.<\/p>\n

During the debate, as\u00a0Wired reports<\/a>, Waggett referred specifically to depictions of biometric technology in dystopian films such as\u00a0Minority Report,\u00a0<\/em>arguing that such technology is now already in place and unavoidable.<\/p>\n

In the film, adapted from Philip K. Dick\u2019s story, the general populace is subjected to total surveillance in the form of Iris scanners linked to a biometric database. The surveillance is often dressed up as or doubled up with targeted advertising and the promotion of mass consumption.<\/p>\n