News Wi-Fi Routers Used to Detect Human Locations, Poses Within a Room

[Admin]

Wi-Fi router signal analysis fed through a deep neural network trained on the human form shows promising results for privacy sensitive monitoring purposes.

Wi-Fi Routers Used to Detect Human Locations, Poses Within a Room : Read more

 

[PlaneInTheSky]

Firstly, the wireframe estimations of human pose are more respectful of human privacy.

Sure it is...

"So we replaced our cameras with the wireframe Wi-Fi system. But it's hard to recognize anyone."

"Well, that obese person in the middle is clearly John. And the short one is Marry. As long as we tag our employees by body features we can recognize them."

 

[Integr8d]

Total Recall (the good one).

 

[atomicWAR]

Because this won't be misused and abused...

 

[jkflipflop98]

Look at everyone freaking out over "muh privacy!".

Yet you'll line up overnight to pay a premium for the latest version of a device that listens to everything you say and reports your position at all times.

 

[zoridon]

Look at everyone freaking out over "muh privacy!".

Yet you'll line up overnight to pay a premium for the latest version of a device that listens to everything you say and reports your position at all times.

Actually I don't line up all day for anything especially to pay extra just to get a gadget 1 month before anyone else but I get your point. Digital privacy should be required in HS curriculum nation wide.

 

[atomicWAR]

Look at everyone freaking out over "muh privacy!".

Yet you'll line up overnight to pay a premium for the latest version of a device that listens to everything you say and reports your position at all times.

I do my best on privacy and I am not one to wait in a line. I'll snag what ever tech toy online when I snag one online and only when I can reasonably afford it. As a paraplegic with fairly catastrophic chronic pain, queuing up in cold weather for a status symbol while paying to give my privacy/rights away for a cell is just is not my thing. But I don't think you had me personally in your sights.

You're not wrong about the vast majority of sheeple in regards to cell phones (and a lot of other tech toys). I've honestly thought of ditching my cell all together. I only keep it at this point as a security blanket should I fall out of my chair or need some emergency assistance regardless of my location (mostly). I've thought of down grading to a flip phone as well but even when you get a non google/apple based product your still stuck with GPS and cell towers broadcasting your location for those who know how to look. In the end there are better options to protect your privacy but its nearly impossible to avoid completely without disconnecting from everything which most folks just won't do these days.

Man that convo made me want to look for flip phones yet again.... have a good one jkflipflop98!

edit: yes I get the irony of what I said with my current system but plz keep in mind I came from a ten year old x79 mobo w/ a used 1680 V2 running a 2080ti all water cooled...in my new build I could have left the 2080ti until GPU prices dropped below msrps (I got an msrp 4090 not a scalped card) but I honestly didn't want to water cool my GPU again due to the hassles of timing gpu buys with my yearly water maintenance or having to do a seperate drain of my system to install an upgrade. Plus all hassle of not being able to easily troubleshoot other GPUs on my system and general easy access to PCIe slots/SATA. controllers which again frequently required me to drain my system. Using only a CPU water block makes it all go away...I got lazy in middle age.

 

[cyrusfox]

Because this won't be misused and abused...

I have been hearing about this capability for years... I would be surprised if it isn't already actively in use and abuse by state party actors. While we don't have another Snowden coming forward to openly reveal what the 3 letter agencies are up to, this is likely one of the many tools at their disposal.

 

[pointa2b]

I'm sure the FBI/NSA have no interest abusing this at all... lol.

This is why I don't care about WIFI 8 or whatever is being shoved down our throat nowadays. Wired devices are the way to go if you value your security.

 

[cyrusfox]

Very relevant clip, 15 years old

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRELLH86Edo

Same concept, different frequency application

 

[CtrlAltSpoods]

Shopping centres/Malls have been doing this for over a decade, it's one of the main drivers to provide 'Free Wi-Fi', it's in the T's and C's that no one bothers to read that they can attempt to grab location data and use it how they please.
They then process this data to work out what shops are the most popular, and where foot traffic is the heaviest. (Possibly adjust rent price based on this data? I do not know)

 

[CtrlAltSpoods]

Sure it is...

"So we replaced our cameras with the wireframe Wi-Fi system. But it's hard to recognize anyone."

"Well, that obese person in the middle is clearly John. And the short one is Marry. As long as we tag our employees by body features we can recognize them."

I'd prefer to have a Wi-Fi based presence detection system over a camera based one in my house, would be great to have all lights automatically turn off when it detects no one is in the room, or home at all.
Would be universal for house-sitters/guests without requirement for connecting to the Wi-Fi or setting up an app.

Samsung has a product for this, but it still does not have the range that this would have.

At least if it was hacked it wouldn't have the capability to allow for people to spy with a real-time HD video feed and it would cover much more than what a camera can see.

 

[USAFRet]

Yet you'll line up overnight to pay a premium for the latest version of a device that listens to everything you say and reports your position at all times.

Speak for yourself.

My 5 year old $100 cellphone is frequently not with me, or at 0% battery.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Shopping centres/Malls have been doing this for over a decade, it's one of the main drivers to provide 'Free Wi-Fi', it's in the T's and C's that no one bothers to read that they can attempt to grab location data and use it how they please.
They then process this data to work out what shops are the most popular, and where foot traffic is the heaviest. (Possibly adjust rent price based on this data? I do not know)

Recording which/how many devices are connected to a wireless AP is completely different than the tech being described in this article.

 

[Rdslw]

Studdies like that are important to show how much data each device, even those you would not suspect, are able to spy on you.
Now please legally kill this before it lay eggs.

 

[ShardCollector]

I can see a genuine use case for this as a failsafe method to make sure we have gotten everyone out of the building in case of some emergency.

Other than that, it should never be used.

 

[jkflipflop98]

Recording which/how many devices are connected to a wireless AP is completely different than the tech being described in this article.

No, he means they can use multiple access points throughout the shopping center to track your exact location. Which is pretty much the same thing as this article. Different method, same end result.

 

[TJ Hooker]

No, he means they can use multiple access points throughout the shopping center to track your exact location. Which is pretty much the same thing as this article. Different method, same end result.

Ah, yes, I did misundertand them then. Still, it's really not the same thing. Triangulating your location with a few APs only tells you where the person is, not what they're doing and/or how they're oriented. And it only works if that person has a wifi enabled device on their person. That is not equivalent to the tech in this article, in a similar way that being able to track someone's location based on their cellphone's GPS is not equivalent as having a live video feed of that person.

 

[DiegoSynth]

Price can be a fraction of a router's price, as it doesn't need to route, switch or act as a hub.
The results are impressive in some of the images. Not so much in others. Maybe paired with cameras (depth?) it can work as a much more accurate system!

 

[oddthought]

why do we need this... what part of this technology benefits the end user in any way. I mean obviously at this point we've given up on privacy, so just cctv the cities and put surveillance cameras in the houses... at your own expense.

It's like some cartoon supervillain is just setting up the big reveal about how we engineered our own slide into becoming cogs in the machine ala 1984 or Brazil, and they got the people being surveilled to pay for it. If this was happening on a TV show we would say it was obvious, cliche, and fundamentally uninteresting.
All I'm saying is could we use this creativity to create awesomeness, rather than dystopia

 

[Deleted member 14196]

why do we need this... what part of this technology benefits the end user in any way. I mean obviously at this point we've given up on privacy, so just cctv the cities and put surveillance cameras in the houses... at your own expense.

It's like some cartoon supervillain is just setting up the big reveal about how we engineered our own slide into becoming cogs in the machine ala 1984 or Brazil, and they got the people being surveilled to pay for it. If this was happening on a TV show we would say it was obvious, cliche, and fundamentally uninteresting.
All I'm saying is could we use this creativity to create awesomeness, rather than dystopia

They need this, violate your privacy, of course

 

[Lanker]

Overall this is technology that seems to require two routers at least which not all places or houses have, especially not in close enough proximity to each other if you value having good wifi coverage in your house, so not necessarily that horrible for privacy.
In terms of usage, this could prove really good for tracking of people in need in a less invasive way e.g. patients in a hospital/disabled people, also very useful in prisons and in relation to gaming/media would be a good, cheap way for VR body tracking and motion capturing.
Not a bad invention by all means.

 

[bit_user]

Look at everyone freaking out over "muh privacy!".

Yet you'll line up overnight to pay a premium for the latest version of a device that listens to everything you say and reports your position at all times.

The best solution to protect "muh privacy!" is legislative. So much of the tech we use is "leaky" of personal information, even in the cases where it's not designed to be. We really need to target the collection and use of personal information with rules and penalties, in the same spirit as GDPR.

 

[bit_user]

I have been hearing about this capability for years... I would be surprised if it isn't already actively in use and abuse by state party actors. While we don't have another Snowden coming forward to openly reveal what the 3 letter agencies are up to, this is likely one of the many tools at their disposal.

I'm sure the FBI/NSA have no interest abusing this at all... lol.

They need this, violate your privacy, of course

Before your imagination gets too carried away and the paranoia sets in, there are two important limiting factors in the experiment described by the article:

1. They used 2 separate Wi Fi devices - an emitter and a collector.
2. They used training data for the deep learning algorithm in two different scenarios. The first was including samples from all datasets, while the second excluded samples from the router arrangement used for the test set. Not surprisingly, the second scenario performed very poorly.

The big implication of #2 is that the training needs to match the router's setup. If you move either router (or even just re-aim one of their antennas, I assume), then the setup will need to be re-trained with a camera. So, at least for the time being, don't worry about anyone hacking into your router and using it to watch you!

Whenever there's an article about a research paper, it usually pays to follow the link and have a look at the actual paper.

 

[bit_user]

No, he means they can use multiple access points throughout the shopping center to track your exact location. Which is pretty much the same thing as this article.

No, it's not. The article is very much about using wifi for imaging humans present in the space between the emitter and receiver, and seeing not only where they are but also what they're doing. However, it cannot directly distinguish one human from another.

What you're talking about just treats the MAC address of the wifi device as a unique identifier and tracks it using simple triangulation. That requires that the subjects each have a device on them, with wifi enabled. The method described in the article doesn't.

The similarities are superficial, only. Please don't make such reckless comments. I know you're smart enough to appreciate the differences, if you think for a moment.