Russian Photography Student Proves How Easy it is to Find People Online
There's a multitude of ways out there to find someone online through their photo. The easiest way to do so being a Google image search that will allow you to find that picture on their profile. But this recent project using a Russian app by a photography student has made it clear that in some ways it's possible to take a photo of someone you see around and use that to find them online.
FindFace is a Russian app that allows you to upload a photo and it will find social media accounts with similar looking pictures. It looks at the photos and finds similar features before providing you with a list that would allow you to add them on your social media accounts. This could be kind of useful if you want to quickly find someone you met at a concert and took a selfie with or anyone you have a picture of only to have forgotten their name, but it could also be used to stalk people. Not everyone is going to ask your opinion before they snap your photo and search for you. And this is exactly what 21 year old Egor Tsvetkov was trying to highlight in his Your Face Is Big Data project.
Tsvetkov rode the Metro in Moscow for two weeks and took photos of the people sitting across from him. He then used FindFace to find those people's social media accounts on VK. The fact he successfully did so is kind of worrying. Even though he is a photographer, he isn't seeing the photos he snapped as art, but as a way to highlight this issue. FindFace isn't software you have to pay for and it's easy enough to find apps and services like this. With just a picture anyone can find you online with minimum effort.
This app itself isn't available in English and when Buzzfeed asked Russians how they felt about this app, many didn't feel it was doing anything particularly bad that people couldn't do easily anyway. People have become so blase about how easily they can be found online and that is more terrifying than people's ability to do so.
If you're going to post your photos online then be careful. You must remember that anyone could find you so have your privacy settings as high as you can and always monitor friend requests. You don't want someone to snap a photo of you on the underground and then try and befriend you without you knowing who they are.
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| Buzzfeed |
Tsvetkov rode the Metro in Moscow for two weeks and took photos of the people sitting across from him. He then used FindFace to find those people's social media accounts on VK. The fact he successfully did so is kind of worrying. Even though he is a photographer, he isn't seeing the photos he snapped as art, but as a way to highlight this issue. FindFace isn't software you have to pay for and it's easy enough to find apps and services like this. With just a picture anyone can find you online with minimum effort.
This app itself isn't available in English and when Buzzfeed asked Russians how they felt about this app, many didn't feel it was doing anything particularly bad that people couldn't do easily anyway. People have become so blase about how easily they can be found online and that is more terrifying than people's ability to do so.
If you're going to post your photos online then be careful. You must remember that anyone could find you so have your privacy settings as high as you can and always monitor friend requests. You don't want someone to snap a photo of you on the underground and then try and befriend you without you knowing who they are.
Rosina is a Songbird rookie with a degree in Creative Writing. She's trying to focus on her novel on the side but is hoping that Content Writing will turn out to be a good career choice in the mean time! Follow her @Songbird_Rosina
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Russian Photography Student Proves How Easy it is to Find People Online
Reviewed by Unknown
on
Tuesday, April 19, 2016
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Reviewed by Unknown
on
Tuesday, April 19, 2016
Rating:
Unknown
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