Explainer | SenseNets: the facial recognition company that supplies China’s Skynet surveillance system
- SenseNets is part of China’s Skynet Project, a national surveillance system aimed a fighting crime and preventing possible disasters, according to Chinese authorities
While the millions of surveillance cameras on every corner of China’s major streets may make some people feel safe and secure, the fact that they are monitoring each and every move you make for posterity and that your personal data could be up for grabs is likely to provoke a different emotion.
SenseNets, a Chinese firm that offers facial recognition and crowd analysis technology and which has been working with China’s police force, made global media headlines earlier this year when a Dutch security researcher revealed its surveillance database was publicly available for months, compromising the personal data of millions of people.
It was also revealed that the Shenzhen company had been tracking the movement of more than 2.5 million people in the far-western Xinjiang region, where China has been accused of locking up more than a million mainly Uygur Muslims in mass internment camps.
Victor Gevers, co-founder of non-profit organisation GDI.Foundation, tweeted in February that an online database belonging to SenseNets containing names, ID card numbers, birth dates and location data was left unprotected for months. The exposed data also showed about 6.7 million location points linked to people, tagged with descriptions such as “mosque”, “hotel”, “internet cafe” and other places where surveillance cameras were likely to be found.
Instead of going on the offensive over the Gevers tweet, SenseNets has adopted a different approach and remained silent. A call to the company’s general phone number listed on its website was answered by a female representative who said the company does not have anyone in charge of media relations and there was no need for an interview.