Erosion of Privacy in Computer Vision Systems
Maciej Smiatacz

During the last decade the progress in the field of computer vision has become incredibly fast. Five years ago the algorithms of pattern recognition and picture processing seemed to be too complex to have real-life applications. Today even personal computers are fast enough to perform these tasks effectively and the first commercial computer vision systems have been offered. Although they may help to combat fraud, reduce crime or speed the passage of people at airports some attention must be given to the problem of "erosion of privacy" that can be caused by this technology. From the ethical point of view, a number of issues related to the use of machine vision are worth discussing.

The idea of biometrics is introduced and the first of two ethical problems is discussed. The third section concentrates on potential misuse of automatic surveillance and contains remarks about the effects that further development of computer vision technology may have on our life. In the fourth section the dark side of Internet vision is considered, and at the end of this work some conclusions are presented.