Gaza, Israel | This is how Israel draws a map for all Gaza residents: – Complete dehumanization

It has been 185 days since daily life for Gaza's 2.3 million residents changed dramatically.

– I don’t understand how this happened or how they suddenly knew my full name, says poet Abu Taha (31 years old) to New York times.

What he refers to happened on November 19 last year. She was on her way to Egypt from Gaza with her family when they had to pass through an Israeli military checkpoint equipped with cameras equipped with facial recognition technology.

After Toha's face was photographed, it was run through an artificial intelligence program that thought he was on a wanted list.

The 31-year-old was taken and arrested. Tuhas explained to the newspaper that he was beaten and interrogated for two days before he was finally released, without any explanation as to why he was arrested in the first place.

Three different sources, who stated with the caveat that their names were not printed, told the newspaper that this was a practical practice.

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Widespread use of AI

The newspaper wrote that at the end of 2023, Israel introduced a large-scale facial recognition program in Gaza to index and obtain images of Palestinians’ faces, without their consent.

Israel also adopted this technology on October 7. At the time, the goal was to capture Israelis captured during the Hamas attack.

After the Israeli ground invasion of Gaza began, the use of facial recognition technology was gradually changed to filter out people whom Israel believes have ties to Hamas and other armed groups in the Gaza Strip.

By reviewing surveillance images and videos published by Hamas itself, the images were entered into the database. These images were again used as reference images for the new images that people constantly receive in the Gaza Strip and at Israeli checkpoints.

The facial recognition program is part of the Israeli Cyber ​​Intelligence Directorate, which in turn is part of Israeli Military Intelligence.

They use technology from Israeli company Corsight, but also facial recognition technology from Google Photos. Israeli intelligence officers say they have uploaded a database of “known Hamas figures” to Google Photos, which they use to verify Palestinians being screened at Israeli checkpoints in Gaza.

One of these soldiers tells the newspaper that only a small part of the face of the person being scanned needs to be visible in the photo so that Google Photos can find another photo of the same person, which makes Google's service very useful.

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He reacts strongly to Israeli surveillance

Anna Paciarelli is the technology director at Human Rights Watch. It is reacting strongly to Israel's widespread use of facial recognition technology on Gazans.

“Facial recognition surveillance used in this way undermines rights under international human rights law,” Pacciarelli said. Objection_.

According to Google Laws Google Images may not be used to “promote activities, goods, information or services that may cause serious harm to people.” Google spokesman Joshua Cruz recently told The Intercept that the company cannot be held responsible for Israel's use of its photo service.

Google Photos is a free product and largely available to the public. It helps you organize photos by sorting photos by similar faces, so you can easily find old photos. Cruz told the newspaper that the service does not help identify the unknown people in the photo.

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The widespread misuse of facial recognition technology

There has been rapid development in the field of artificial intelligence in recent years. Technology can be used for many things and comes in many forms.

This technology could be used, for example, to make check-in at airports more flexible, but it could also be used for more controversial purposes.

In Russia, artificial intelligence and facial recognition were used to find out who participated in demonstrations in support of the late Putin critic Alexei Navalny. In China, the government has used technology to track and control Uyghurs.

Israel has also used this technology in the past. it has been written And mentioned About an app used by Israeli soldiers in the West Bank called Blue Wolf.

The Israeli soldiers then took a photo of the person they were going to control, and the app gave results based on different color codes if the person could be found in the photo archive. A person's status in the archives determines whether they will be arrested, detained, or released.

in condition From The Washington Post, an Israeli soldier describes the app as “Facebook for Palestinians.” Israeli soldiers explain that they competed to photograph the largest number of Palestinians and then upload the photos to the “Blue Wolf” website, and that whoever took the largest number of photos won prizes.

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Current affairs at home

In the field of artificial intelligence, a lot happens every day, and at home too. In January, the European Union introduced a new regulatory framework for AI, which will set guidelines for the use of AI in Europe.

But the bill has been criticized, among other things, because the law allows police to use facial recognition technology, even only when there is suspicion. Despite criticism, the law was passed in March.

EU legislation on artificial intelligence is also set to be implemented in Norway, according to Digitalization Minister Karianne Tong (AFP), and quickly. On Friday last week, the proposal was presented to the Council of Ministers. Tong called for the need to implement it as soon as possible.

– We plan to do everything we can so that this happens as quickly as possible, so that we can implement the law as simultaneously as possible with the European Union, she told NTB.