Vocal Voices

So, a bar in London is introducing a camera facial-recognition system that will prompt their bartenders, in the general scheme of things, who to serve next, rather than the guy (or gal!) who pushes in front of you bellowing orders and waving a £20 squid note or two. The camera sees who approaches the bar first, and then displays your head on a monitor with a circle round it indicating id your first, second or third in the queue. Facial recognition will also match you to your bar tab, and if you're under 25, the system will flag you up as someone to be challenged. Apparently, all this will so speed things up that yer average barman will be able to draw an extra 1,600 pints a year. The facial images are, it is said, going to be deleted every night, but if you believe that ….. they'll be retained, I'll bet, to identify repeat troublemakers and drunks.

So far so good.

Then we also have the curious case of AFC Stoneham FC, a non-descript Step 5 Wessex League club based in Eastleigh with probably around 100 regular fans, who have signed up to move in September into a brand-new £9m (I think) sports complex on the edge of town. I'm interested because I could at a pinch walk it from Southampton Airport Parkway station, but there's a snag. This stadium is operated by the Hampshire Football Association in conjunction with the FA ParkLife scheme, which may or may not be based in Liverpool, but I digress. To enter the ground to watch an AFC Stoneham game, versus say Shaftesbury or Brockenhurst, you have to be "pre-registered". You have to have gone on-line with the Hants FA, completed a form, and been furnished with your own individual QR Code. This you will need to download to your mobile phone, and show it at the gate to gain entry. The reason for this is so that the FA "can better understand" how you are using its facilities, and (in the small print) to ensure compliance with safeguarding standards. And that applies to everybody - home players and supporters, away team players, management and fans, casual soccer fans like me who'll probably only intend to visit the damned place once, even the guy selling the pasties.

Now you may think these two examples are actually quite good ideas, but my question is - is this the thin edge of an extremely large wedge and where will it all finish up? How long before you going to have to pre-register to visit your local park? How long before you have to register to visit your local pub? Are we now seriously going the Chinese Society route?

Personally, I find all this "active" surveillance (as compared to passive CCTV for example) extremely intrusive. And I won't be going to watch AFC Stoneham, largely because I have no idea how to download a QR Code onto a mobile phone even if I wanted to , but that's a different issue.

I can honestly say that I have never once set out to break the law. I might have broken a few, but they were unintentional mistakes or my misunderstanding or wrong interpretations of the rules. I DO NOT need to be surveilled to any degree, never mind the nth, so I do my part to screw the systems.

I pay cash whenever I can drawn from different ATMs. I will not use tap-to-pay. I will not have banking apps on my phone. I will not use internet banking. QR codes - do be brief! I will not fill in surveys for anyone or I fill them in with total rubbish. I have two throwaway email addresses for those sites that demand an email address. I will not text STOP to anything and I do not ask to be removed from an email listing - everything goes to spam and is auto-deleted when I logoff. If I have to sign up for something I give the minimum information possible, with maybe a few spelling mistakes thrown in.

I cannot not be surveilled, but I will sure as hell have fun pissing them about.

I agree it's to intrusive I won't bank oneline it's cash for me I refuse to have a DD account no mobile phone but I do shop on line I think there are new rules to shop on line coming out about registration with a .Hope phone but I only half read it we shall see worlds gone mad ossie

TheOstrich wrote:my question is - is this the thin edge of an extremely large wedge and where will it all finish up? How long before you going to have to pre-register to visit your local park? How long before you have to register to visit your local pub? Are we now seriously going the Chinese Society route?

Yes, I reckon so. Politicians love power and the more power they can exercise the happier they are. So they will be quite happy to push for this.

cromwell wrote:So they will be quite happy to push for this.

They do not have to push too hard.... we are almost there, and we freely sign up.

A lot was made some time back about loyalty cards and how invasive they were / are. So, ask yourself this: Do I use my debit / credit card to pay for my shopping? If you do you are "in", just look at your receipt,

Every item you bought: check.
Store code for each item: check.
Price: check
Bar code system: check
Bar code reader identifier: check
Store location: check
Time of visit: check
Type of card: check
PIN verification: check
A/C No: check
Expiry date: check
Which till: check
Authorisation number: check
Uniqe 20 digit TCN: check (Transaction Code Number)

And all stored on unconnected and secure servers: ???

Gotcha!

Oh look! Mrs Thruxton-Circuit, 23 Acacia Gardens, buys 1ltr of gin and two tonics every other day to go along with the 200 fags per week and the 21 high fat, high salt and high sugar ready meals.

Now, who might be interested in that info I wonder: NHS, DVLA, Insurance companies, Police, DWP, Advertisers, HMRC, Banks, criminals etc?

But don't worry, their databases are not in any way connected.... are they?

Oh look! Mrs Thruxton-Circuit, 23 Acacia Gardens, buys 1ltr of gin and two tonics every other day to go along with the 200 fags per week and the 21 high fat, high salt and high sugar ready meals.

Yep. And if you don't believe Frank is correct on that - I've got a Waitrose loyalty card. Every few months, they send out special offer vouchers. These are tailored to what (their computer system sees) I regularly buy. So they're usually for KitKats!