"Your face mask selfies could be training the next facial recognition tool"

It's getting to the point where the only biometric data that will be required is the distance between the pupils.*

From c|net:

Researchers are crawling the internet for photos of people wearing face masks to improve facial recognition algorithms.

Your face mask selfies aren't just getting seen by your friends and family -- they're also getting collected by researchers looking to use them to improve facial recognition algorithms. CNET found thousands of face-masked selfies up for grabs in public data sets, with pictures taken directly from Instagram.  

The COVID-19 pandemic is causing a surge in people wearing face masks, and facial recognition companies are scrambling to keep up. Face masks cover up a significant portion of what facial recognition needs to identify and detect people -- essentially threatening the future of a multimillion-dollar industry unless the technology can learn to recognize people beyond the coverings.

To do that, they need more masked photos to train their algorithms.

In April, researchers published the COVID19 Mask Image Dataset to Github, using more than 1,200 images collected from Instagram. A month earlier, researchers from China compiled a database with more than 5,000 masked photos they gathered online.
The creators behind the April database used their AI startup Workaround to help comb through the images and properly label them with masks on or off, said Wafaa Arbash, the company's CEO....MUCH MORE

Also at c|net:
iPhone's Face ID now unlocks faster when you wear a face mask. Here's what to do

*As long suffering reader knows, we have been working to defeat the CCTV voyeurs for many years and are very close to unveiling "Chameleon Eyes" to deal with this exact problem:
June 2014
I'm Tellin' Ya, It's a Bull Market

I'm tellin' ya...