Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Live Saturday
Interview with Elain Newton
Aired October 11, 2003 - 12:42 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: So you spend a lot of time on the Internet. Someone could be watching you and it might not be big brother. Even your neighbor could be keeping an eye on you. It's a project called Camera Watch at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. And technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg now joins with us the latest -- Daniel.
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN TECHNOLOGY CORRESPONDENT: This will be a rather eye opening story for a lot of people who aren't aware they may appear on several cameras every day. But who's watching the watchers. From Carnegie Mellon University, we're joined by Elaine Newton a Phd fellow and the co-originator of the Camera Watch Project. Thanks for joining us. Start by telling us exactly why you came up with this idea. It does sound a little bit like spy versus spy, where you're keeping and eye on people who are keeping an eye on other people.
ELAINE NEWTON, CARNEGIE MELLON UNIV.: Right. Daniel. Thanks for having me. We are trying to document the way personal data is created on other individuals. And we are speaking to the explosion of data, including all types of text fields, like Social Security numbers and other behavioral type of things. This shows you video data.
SIEBERG: We're seeing the Web site here the Carnegie Mellon Web site, where you can choose a particular city and find out where the web cams are located.
What types of cameras are we talking about?
NEWTON: Most of these are Department of Transportation cameras. Some of these are cameras on University campuses. But these can be owned by individuals or the government or companies that have cameras outside their buildings.
SIEBERG: We have a live feed outside New York's Time Square. You can go on line and see some people going about their daily business not aware they're being watched.
Tell us something about what the researchers there at Carnegie Mellon have whether it's national security or privacy?
NEWTON: It's all of the above. The national security issue is simply anyone anywhere at any time can look at almost any corner of America and watch us, with any motivation. So, that's one concern. The other is a privacy concern. How does it affect individual's privacy. And also, freedom of association and freedom of speech. Are these cameras pointed at a political rally, or maybe a meeting happening where a camera is at, you don't want others to know you attended.
SIEBERG: Right. We're seeing one of the cameras at George Washington University, where you can control the camera online. You can zoom in on somebody who is just walking along on the street, rather unsuspecting as well. Now, I know a lot of your research also deals with bio-metrics, facial recognition technology. We heard examples of that recently where that hasn't been working, or where it's been taken away or not being used.
Tell me why it's not ready for prime time yet, shall we say, in your opinion?
NEWTON: OK. There are lots of reason. There are lots of angles at which your face could be in relation to the camera. So, if you're facing the camera front -- in a frontal pose, that's the easiest for face recognition algorithms to work on. But there are other issues, like lighting, something might be covering your face, you might look different with age. There are lots of different issues to be solved to make that work.
SIEBERG: Do you think it will be adopted in the future by various security agencies for that reason?
Will it eventually be ready for that type of use?
NEWTON: I think it's day will come. But what I'm hoping is the government will also think about policies for when it's appropriate for face recognition to be used and when it's not.
SIEBERG: Lets quickly if we can go back to the camera watch database. Will that be expanding or continuing.
Can people find their own city if they go to that Web site eventually?
NEWTON: Definitely. They're continuously finding Web cams and loading them up there. There are about 1, 000 right now. There's an estimate of 10,000 Web cams on the Internet.
SIEBERG: Elaine Newton, Ph.d. Fellow there at Carnegie Mellon University. Thank you so much for joining us to talk about this.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired October 11, 2003 - 12:42 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: So you spend a lot of time on the Internet. Someone could be watching you and it might not be big brother. Even your neighbor could be keeping an eye on you. It's a project called Camera Watch at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. And technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg now joins with us the latest -- Daniel.
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN TECHNOLOGY CORRESPONDENT: This will be a rather eye opening story for a lot of people who aren't aware they may appear on several cameras every day. But who's watching the watchers. From Carnegie Mellon University, we're joined by Elaine Newton a Phd fellow and the co-originator of the Camera Watch Project. Thanks for joining us. Start by telling us exactly why you came up with this idea. It does sound a little bit like spy versus spy, where you're keeping and eye on people who are keeping an eye on other people.
ELAINE NEWTON, CARNEGIE MELLON UNIV.: Right. Daniel. Thanks for having me. We are trying to document the way personal data is created on other individuals. And we are speaking to the explosion of data, including all types of text fields, like Social Security numbers and other behavioral type of things. This shows you video data.
SIEBERG: We're seeing the Web site here the Carnegie Mellon Web site, where you can choose a particular city and find out where the web cams are located.
What types of cameras are we talking about?
NEWTON: Most of these are Department of Transportation cameras. Some of these are cameras on University campuses. But these can be owned by individuals or the government or companies that have cameras outside their buildings.
SIEBERG: We have a live feed outside New York's Time Square. You can go on line and see some people going about their daily business not aware they're being watched.
Tell us something about what the researchers there at Carnegie Mellon have whether it's national security or privacy?
NEWTON: It's all of the above. The national security issue is simply anyone anywhere at any time can look at almost any corner of America and watch us, with any motivation. So, that's one concern. The other is a privacy concern. How does it affect individual's privacy. And also, freedom of association and freedom of speech. Are these cameras pointed at a political rally, or maybe a meeting happening where a camera is at, you don't want others to know you attended.
SIEBERG: Right. We're seeing one of the cameras at George Washington University, where you can control the camera online. You can zoom in on somebody who is just walking along on the street, rather unsuspecting as well. Now, I know a lot of your research also deals with bio-metrics, facial recognition technology. We heard examples of that recently where that hasn't been working, or where it's been taken away or not being used.
Tell me why it's not ready for prime time yet, shall we say, in your opinion?
NEWTON: OK. There are lots of reason. There are lots of angles at which your face could be in relation to the camera. So, if you're facing the camera front -- in a frontal pose, that's the easiest for face recognition algorithms to work on. But there are other issues, like lighting, something might be covering your face, you might look different with age. There are lots of different issues to be solved to make that work.
SIEBERG: Do you think it will be adopted in the future by various security agencies for that reason?
Will it eventually be ready for that type of use?
NEWTON: I think it's day will come. But what I'm hoping is the government will also think about policies for when it's appropriate for face recognition to be used and when it's not.
SIEBERG: Lets quickly if we can go back to the camera watch database. Will that be expanding or continuing.
Can people find their own city if they go to that Web site eventually?
NEWTON: Definitely. They're continuously finding Web cams and loading them up there. There are about 1, 000 right now. There's an estimate of 10,000 Web cams on the Internet.
SIEBERG: Elaine Newton, Ph.d. Fellow there at Carnegie Mellon University. Thank you so much for joining us to talk about this.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
