this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2025
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Privacy

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Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 113 points 1 week ago (8 children)

To be clear, the system picked out faces in the crowd, in the "yes, this is a face" sense. They were labeled in what appears to be random terms like positive, kind, nostalgic, bee keeper, gif animator, extreme ironer. No personal identification.

[–] trailee@sh.itjust.works 20 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Oh that’s very interesting. I didn’t get that nuance from the article. Do you have a link to more info?

[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yes, it's the link to the Youtube clip in the embed in the article.

[–] spizzat2@lemmy.zip 17 points 1 week ago

Specifically, this link, which looked like a twitter link to me.

[–] scarilog@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Yeah this article is hot garbage. What "biometric data" are they talking about??? Just images of people's faces? My understanding is that it's super commonplace in public locations, are people really that surprised?

[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 week ago

Yes, while its generally common on this platform, we are early adopters for tech so we understand it first. The general public gets exposure much slower, especially when there is efforts to subvert it for profit.

Attention and time are limited, those that focus on tech know things first. Its the same as a chef knowing about food more than the average person.

[–] janonymous@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago (3 children)

That is technically biometric data

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[–] unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 81 points 1 week ago (5 children)

The only people offended by this are the ones who dont yet understand that this is happening constantly all over the place without your consent already.

[–] bigfondue@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Something happening all the time doesn't mean that it's good and you should just accept it.

[–] unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 34 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

No of course not. But in order to be able to not accept it, you have to know about it in the first place. Thats what this is perfect for. No harm done, lots of eyes opened.

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[–] racemaniac@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Which would be most people?

[–] interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 week ago

Yes, the ignorants, which is exactly why we have artists, it's basically their most important jerb

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[–] merde@sh.itjust.works 77 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Social media erupted with bewildered reactions from attendees. Some praised the band for forcing a conversation about surveillance that most people avoid, while others expressed discomfort with the unexpected data capture.

Unlike typical concert technology that enhances your experience, this facial recognition system explicitly confronted attendees with the reality of data capture. The band made visible what usually happens invisibly—your face being recorded, analyzed, and potentially stored by systems you never explicitly agreed to interact with.

The audience split predictably along ideological lines. Privacy advocates called it a boundary violation disguised as art. Others viewed it as necessary shock therapy for our sleepwalking acceptance of facial recognition in everyday spaces. Both reactions prove the intervention achieved its disruptive goal.

Your relationship with facial recognition technology just got more complicated. Every venue, every event, every public space potentially captures your likeness. Massive Attack simply made the invisible visible—and deeply uncomfortable. The question now isn’t whether this was art or privacy violation, but whether you’re ready to confront how normalized surveillance has become in your daily life.

[–] adespoton@lemmy.ca 13 points 1 week ago (2 children)

This is why I no longer go out in public.

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[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 65 points 1 week ago

Good. A little bit of shock treatment is just what the doctor ordered.

[–] iAvicenna@lemmy.world 49 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Now consider this to coldplay concert where they urged the crowd to send love to Charlie Kirk's family lol.

[–] PolarKraken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 31 points 1 week ago (1 children)

It's okay, if Coldplay is a honeypot to lure execs onto camera to self-own

[–] electric_nan@lemmy.ml 16 points 1 week ago

Damn lol. Didn't think I could like coldplay any less.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 33 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

Pretty cool... But anyone else get major AI vibes from the way this article is written?

Why even become a journalist anymore if you're just going to be putting prompts into a black box and copy/pasting the output?

[–] beegnyoshi@lemmy.zip 18 points 1 week ago

This article gives me vibes that someone wrote a few lines outlining the situation and asked the AI to write the article itself. Interestingly though, I think most people would just rather read the outline, less time wasted and less llm.

A part that screams AI would be:

This wasn’t subtle venue security—your biometric data became part of the artistic statement, whether you consented or not.

"This isn't this--it's that" is an extremely common AI sentence structure, further exposed by the fact that the part before the em-dash doesn't even make sense to begin with. No one was asking themselves whether it was part of subtle venue security.

As a sidenote, sometimes I read sentences like this and I wonder "could this ever even have been written by a human?" I think that there's a very low chance that this article didn't have at least some amount of AI involved, but I know that somewhere out there there must be some people who actually write like this. And that's kind of sad.

tbh I don't even know why I even wrote this, the entire article appears to be one big example of generic AI writing

[–] interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

"The Consent Question Nobody Asked"

Yeah, that tastes like AI this turn of phrase

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[–] trailee@sh.itjust.works 33 points 1 week ago (1 children)

This disturbs me in the best way. I love/hate it.

I wonder how long they can run this before their backend database vendor cuts them off with some flimsy pretext because this kind of thing is bad for business.

[–] lunarul@lemmy.world 34 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

No backend database needed for what they did. It was just highlighting where the faces are in a shot of the crowd, same as modern smsttphone cameras do, but with a surveillance-type UI around it.

[–] trailee@sh.itjust.works 18 points 1 week ago (6 children)

Thanks, I just watched the video linked by @spizzat2@lemmy.zip and I see that now. It’s actually a little disappointing and I’d love to see the same kind of public spectacle on hard mode with real-time doxxing from a commercial backend. That would be far more provocative.

I think the article hugely understated that nuance.

[–] lunarul@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Most people don't know the difference, as made clear by the reactions of the public, comments on other social platforms, and the wording of the articles. So it's just as powerful as it was.

[–] trailee@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I will agree that it was still powerful. All of the phone videos would memorialize any real doxxing so it’s maybe just as well that they didn’t do it.

I think it would be better with minor obfuscation like F***e L***e for Firstname Lastname. Something instantly recognizable to the victims/participants but not for the entire audience.

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[–] LordCrom@lemmy.world 23 points 1 week ago

Good. People don't understand implications until it happens to them. Suddenly they don't like this security features anymore because it became personal.

We need more people to experience that discomfort

[–] apotheotic@beehaw.org 20 points 1 week ago (3 children)

People getting mad at massive attack are missing the point completely

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[–] Zerush@lemmy.ml 19 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Nice, face recognition surveillance for sure is because to protect our childrens.

[–] interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 12 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Who the hell can afford children ?

[–] jnod4@lemmy.ca 7 points 1 week ago

Some people on islands can afford many

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[–] desmosthenes@lemmy.world 17 points 1 week ago

the 20th anniversary of mezzanine @ radio city with full orchestral band all instrumental was wiiiiild too; kudos!

[–] Bloomcole@lemmy.world 15 points 1 week ago (1 children)

https://x.com/IpswichPolice/status/1892910824517177743

I do trust Massiva Attack more than this violent gang of thugs

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[–] fluckx@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago (14 children)

That was one god awful website. Holy shit. Why would anybody willingly visit that site. Wtf

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[–] HugeNerd@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Citizen, this is the warm embrace of Father State and Mother Country taking care of you. Everywhere. All the time. We care about you. We worry about you. And if we feel like you need help, we will help.

[–] interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 week ago (2 children)
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[–] ThunderQueen@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago

It wasn't live. They use the same footage at every concert.

[–] Zerush@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

If you live in a city (not only) anywhere, you are on at least 5-10 security cams when you leave your home on the way to work or the store, more counting those in your workplace and the store. Unknown how much are with face recognition soft. Think of it, you are tagget.

Worst knowing that a lot of live cams are even with public access and even streaming on YouTube.

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