CIA-backed tech can instantly spot
terrorists in a crowd
WASHINGTON The U.S. intelligence community is
investing in new technology meant to provide instant recognition of insurgency
fugitives in such crowded facilities as airports and subways.
A Los Altos, Calif. company, Pixlogic, has been developing technology meant
to search for fugitives and insurgency suspects in a crowd.
Pixlogic has employed new software based on visual pattern recognition and
search technologies to match archived still or video images with those gathered
from security cameras or other sources, Middle East Newsline reported.
"It does a reasonable job of matching people that sort of look alike,"
Pixlogic chief executive officer Joseph Santucci said. "Most [competing]
software tools only work under constrained circumstances."
Executives said the company's software could also detect and alert
investigators to anomalies in video footage provided by closed-circuit
television systems. Such anomalies could include an individual carrying a large
box, or a truck that returns to the same spot. They said such technology has not
yet been employed in either Britain or the United States.
Industry sources said the U.S. intelligence and law enforcement community was
also expected to increase investment in counter-terrorism technology. They said
the technology would include instant translations, particularly from Arabic to
English, as well as search and text mining.
"We have put a little over 100 technologies into the intelligence community
that are actively being used," In-Q-Tel chief executive officer Gilman Louie
said. "Some of them you know, while other technologies we don't broadly
advertise."
U.S. companies have been wooed by their counterparts in Israel for joint
marketing and development projects in counter-insurgency. Several Israeli firms
have been developing software and sensors to track insurgency suspects and
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