Photos on Facebook Lead to Hacking of Facial Recognition System

Most tech firms depend on the technology of facial recognition to verify their users. But the researcher's team from North Carolina University in security conference of Usenix that has recently taken place in Austin disclosed that the technology of facial recognition is not quite ideal in the sense that it is commonly believed, and it can also be exploited.

When it was further investigated, the researcher's team disclosed that the profile pictures of Facebook are responsible for the exploitation. During the conference, research team also displayed the technique by which attackers are able to compromise systems that use the facial recognition as their key verification technique. They created the 3-dimensional facial models, and have effectively used that to deceive all the 4 systems of facial recognition. These models are mainly created with the help of photos which are available openly. The pictures are displayed through mobile virtual technology in trying to trick the technology of facial recognition.

UNC team collected 20 volunteers to experiment via proficient photographs, picture web indexes, as well as freely available resources on the informal communities such as Linkedln, Facebook, and Google+ and built 3D models of their faces. Later on, these were tweaked to have various facial animations, and eyes are also adjusted to show that they are looking at camera.

All five systems that were tested - Mobius, 1D, KeyLemon, BioID, and TrueKey - are available in the iTunes Store and Google Play Store. Although Google has warned before that similar software "is less secure than a PIN, pattern, or password," because "someone who looks similar to you could unlock your phone," it could be much easier than believed before.

Hackread.com posted on August 22nd, 2016, stating that the lone solution is embedding of hardware and sensors, and adoption of preventive measures by going beyond webcams and mobile cameras.

Team member True Price said: "some vendors -- most notably Microsoft with its Windows Hello software -- already have commercial solutions that leverage alternative hardware. However, there is always a cost-benefit to adding hardware, and hardware vendors will need to decide whether there is enough demand from and benefit for consumers to add specialized components like IR cameras or structured light projectors".

» SPAMfighter News - 8/26/2016