{"id":1119782,"date":"2021-12-14T23:14:15","date_gmt":"2021-12-15T04:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1119782"},"modified":"2021-12-14T23:14:17","modified_gmt":"2021-12-15T04:14:17","slug":"south-korea-city-to-track-coronavirus-patients-with-facial-recognition-software","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/south-korea-city-to-track-coronavirus-patients-with-facial-recognition-software\/","title":{"rendered":"South Korea City to Track Coronavirus Patients with Facial Recognition Software"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fsouth-korea-city-to-track-coronavirus-patients-with-facial-recognition-software%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1119782&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/GettyImages-1213388818-640x335-1.png\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p class=\"subheading\">Bucheon, South Korea, will begin&nbsp;using an artificial intelligence (AI)-based facial recognition software in January designed to cull images from CCTV cameras and locate, track, and contact trace Chinese coronavirus patients, Reuters <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/asia-pacific\/skorea-test-ai-powered-facial-recognition-track-covid-19-cases-2021-12-13\/\">reported<\/a> Monday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe system uses an AI algorithms and facial recognition technology to analyse footage gathered by more than 10,820 CCTV cameras and track an infected person\u2019s movements, anyone they had close contact with, and whether they were wearing a mask,\u201d Reuters reported on December 13.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"><\/figure>\n<p>The news agency cited an official proposal for the project submitted by Bucheon to South Korea\u2019s Ministry of Science and Information and Communications Technology (ICT) as its source for the information. Park Dae-chul, a South Korean legislator and member of the nation\u2019s main opposition People Power Party (PPP), provided a copy of the 110-page business plan to Reuters for review in recent days.<\/p>\n<p>The pilot program will go into operation at the start of 2022 and has been funded by both the federal South Korean government and the Bucheon municipal government, an unnamed&nbsp;Bucheon city official told Reuters on December 13.<\/p>\n<p>Bucheon is home to more than 800,000 residents and is located roughly 16 miles outside of Seoul, South Korea\u2019s national capital. In addition to being one of South Korea\u2019s most densely populated cities, Bucheon also has \u201cthe highest density of CCTV installations\u201d in South Korea, according to the <em>Chosun Ilbo<\/em>.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p>The leading South Korean newspaper reported on Bucheon\u2019s plans to implement the AI recognition software in late February, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chosun.com\/national\/2021\/02\/27\/CVUO77PTSNDNDC7BMTLURX7UUM\/\">noting<\/a>&nbsp;the city had 8,300 CCTV cameras at the time. Bucheon\u2019s government planned in February to increase the number of CCTV cameras citywide to 10,823 by the end of 2021.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn that case, a dense monitoring network will be equipped with one CCTV [camera] monitoring in every 7 m[eters] horizontal and vertical area [sic],\u201d the <em>Chosun Ilbo<\/em> observed.<\/p>\n<p>Bucheon city officials have argued the new AI software system will ease the workload of an existing, human-based contact tracing system used by both Bucheon and South Korea nationwide to track coronavirus patients and their close contacts.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt sometimes takes hours to analyze a single CCTV footage. Using visual recognition technology will enable that analysis in an instant,\u201d Bucheon Mayor Jang Deog-cheon wrote on Twitter in late 2020 while campaigning for federal funding to support the pilot project.<\/p>\n<p>The business plan reviewed by Reuters this week revealed the new facial recognition system \u201ccan simultaneously track up to ten people in five to ten minutes, cutting the time spent on manual work that takes around half an hour to one hour to trace one person.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B3\" class=\"a8d adSo\"><\/figure>\n<p>South Korea\u2019s Ministry of Science and ICT recently said it \u201chas no current plans to expand the project to the national level\u201d and merely hopes to use the AI-based system \u201cto digitize some of the manual labor that contact tracers currently have to carry out [in Bucheon].\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Critics of the system, including human rights advocates and some South Korean lawmakers, say they <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bcmaeil.com\/bcmaeil\/news.html?news_num=12215\">fear<\/a> the South Korean government will retain data culled during the pilot program and harness it beyond the needs of the current Chinese coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe government\u2019s plan to become a Big Brother on the pretext of COVID [Chinese coronavirus] is a neo-totalitarian idea,\u201d South Korean legislator Park Dae-chul told Reuters on December 13.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is absolutely wrong to monitor and control the public via CCTV using taxpayers\u2019 money and without the consent from the public,\u201d Park opined.<\/p>\n<p>An unnamed Bucheon city official told the <em>Chosun Ilbo<\/em> in February \u201cinformation collected by CCTV for facial recognition is part of an epidemiological investigation in accordance with the [South Korean] Infectious Disease Prevention Act.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo, it is possible to collect and use information without personal consent, such as mobile [phone] carrier base station information or credit card details,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Even if coronavirus patients do not provide consent for Bucheon to track them via its facial recognition software, \u201cthe system can still track them using their silhouette and clothes,\u201d an unidentified Bucheon city official told Reuters on December 13. The revelation suggests Bucheon city authorities may override a coronavirus patient\u2019s consent refusal in certain circumstances and track them using the new AI-based system regardless of their response.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bucheon, South Korea, will begin\u00a0using an artificial intelligence (AI)-based facial recognition software in January designed to cull images from CCTV cameras and locate, track, and contact trace Chinese coronavirus patients, &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1119782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1119782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1119782"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1119782\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1119782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1119782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1119782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}