A Plan UK billboard in London that knows your gender and age — creepy or cool?

[Starry Messenger]

http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/article/1136586--a-plan-uk-billboard-in-london-that-knows-your-gender-and-age-creepy-or-cool?bn=1

Sorry, this story is a couple of weeks old, but I vote "creepy"! The end of the article focuses on the potential for discrimination by "tastes", but I could see this going all kinds of wrong for discrimination by gender, race, orientation, and class.

Plan UK’s use of facial recognition software is creative and provocative by using different content for men and women to send a political message, says Teresa Scassa, Canada research chair in information law at the University of Ottawa. She sees it as “the edge of a big wave” of broad social issues that will be addressed in the near future.

But she worries about digital technology accumulating and layering personal information on top of a database of recognizable images. “The problem is the loss of control over our personal information,” she says. “It happens in so many contexts and is applied and matched behind the scenes, so it’s difficult to know as individuals what companies know about us.”

There is also potential for discrimination,” Scassa says. Someone identified as a young, affluent professional may be targeted for special discounts and promotions. Someone else, who shows up as a less desirable customer, may not get those same offers.

“You open the possibility of targeting products and services to classes of individuals while others will be excluded from opportunities. There is the risk of social alienation, profiling done by algorithms, it’s not perfect but it’s making a judgment of who you are and what you like.”