Visiting a casino is a positive experience for most people — an outing in which the food and entertainment can be as much fun as the betting. But for some, gambling becomes an addiction that can ruin their lives.
ECE Professor Kostas Plataniotis and team have come up with a solution that the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation will use to help self-identified gambling addicts.
Tom Marinelli, Acting CEO of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) and Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner Dr. Ann Cavoukian released a white paper on November 12 announcing a major development in privacy-protective facial recognition technology.
This critical system, to be rolled out in 2011 at OLG gaming sites across the province, embeds a design protocol based on Privacy by Design, that will enable the OLG to better support its customers who have enrolled in a completely voluntary self-exclusion program, while protecting the data of all OLG customers.
Speaking at the Toronto CIO Executive Summit, Commissioner Cavoukian said, “This collaboration is based on the application of an emerging technology called Biometric Encryption — which enables both the functionality of the system and privacy to be strongly respected.”
Only when the live facial biometric of a self-excluded user is detected as present, will the system alert the OLG and “unlock” the necessary information, for security to do a manual check. No single key can unlock the complete database of enrolled persons.
“Facial recognition technology will enhance OLG’s current ability to spot self-excluded patrons who fail to stay away from gaming sites. This system helps to strengthen the deterrent for self-excluders to return to our gaming sites,” said OLG’s Marinelli.
“I congratulate our University of Toronto researchers for advancing the application of an emerging technology to produce a made-in-Ontario solution that has the potential to positively impact privacy worldwide,” said Dr. Ann Cavoukian, Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner.
“This Biometric Encryption-based technology will offer dramatically improved privacy protection over simple facial recognition, without compromising any functionality, security or performance — the hallmarks of a Privacy by Design application.”
The new system, developed in collaboration with Oakville, Ontario video surveillance and biometric firm iView Systems and University of Toronto researchers Professor Kostas Plataniotis and Dr. Karl Martin (ECE, PhD 1T0), is scheduled to be implemented by OLG in gaming sites across Ontario in 2011, starting with OLG Slots at Woodbine Racetrack.
Privacy by Design (PbD), a concept developed by Commissioner Cavoukian, prescribes that privacy be embedded directly into the design and operation, not only of various technologies, but also of business processes and networked infrastructure. Instead of treating privacy as an afterthought —”bolting it on after the fact”— PbD is proactive and preventative in nature. A landmark Resolution adopting PbD as an “essential component of fundamental privacy protection” was recently approved by the Council of International Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners in Jerusalem at their annual conference this year.
A spin-off company formed by Professor Plataniotis and Dr. Karl Martin, KMKP Engineering, is currently commercializing this biometric encryption technology beyond face recognition to other modalities, such as iris and fingerprint recognition. KMKP Engineering has partnered with Medical and Research Sciences (MaRS) for this venture.
