Facial-recognition software correctly matched photos of research volunteers to unidentified medical scans of their heads, in a new study of images that are commonly used in brain research. The study then tested facial-recognition software from Microsoft MSFT 0.64% Azure to match an MRI-generated face reconstruction to its owner’s photo. Facial-recognition software also likely wouldn’t work as well when searching for matches across thousands of random photos instead of dozens of images. Still, facial-recognition software continues to make significant advancements in accuracy after a major leap from deep learning in 2014, experts in the technology said. Privacy risks are compounded by rapidly growing amounts of medical data for valuable research, experts in medical and facial-recognition technology said.

Source: Wall Street Journal October 23, 2019 21:00 UTC