Steal Your Face: The FBI Is Storing Your Dimensions, Fearing Criminal Intentions

If you value your privacy, you may want to stock up on extra Halloween masks this season. The FBI has recently announced its state-of-the-art new facial recognition system, and it is creepier than any macabre mask a citizen can don.

According to gizmodo.com, six years of development and a billion dollars of taxpayer money have led to this biometric facial recognition software system. If you're getting a visa, going to prison, or otherwise being photographed by any grabby arm of the government, your identifying facial dimensions are sure going in there. It's called the Next Generation Identification program, and you are getting forced into this future.

But why stop at the shape of your skull and surrounding tissues? They did spend a BILLION of your dollars, after all! Scars, tattoos, fingerprints and other major identifying characteristics will also be included in your (totally safe and secure, we're sure) recognition profile. This shared database, known as the Interstate Photo System, is only going to get more insidious as ubiquitous surveillance camera resolutions improve.

The FBI, of course, loves their new toy. They were proud to report, "Since phase one was deployed in February 2011, the NGI system has introduced enhanced automated fingerprint and latent search capabilities, mobile fingerprint identification, and electronic image storage, all while adding enhanced processing speed and automation for electronic exchange of fingerprints to more than 18,000 law enforcement agencies and other authorized criminal justice partners 24 hours a day, 365 days a year."

It wouldn't be surprising if ninja-style outfits of obscurity became fashionable in the next few years...

So by FBI logic, the best masks are now the ones with no facial characteristics whatsoever.