RealNetworks Free School Facial Recognition

Published Aug 03, 2018 14:25 PM

The company that created RealPlayer is moving beyond media delivery and into the security space with a new facial recognition platform they have developed.

IPVM has written about the difficulties of FST, another face rec software provider that failed, and also about some of the problems with facial recognition in general.

The goal of their initiative, RealNetworks says, is to make schools safer and they are doing it by offering to give facial recognition capability to every K-12 school in the U.S. and Canada--and they are doing it for FREE.

What is the solution? How does it work? How can they afford to do it? In this report, we examine RealNetworks' history and financial problems, their free and claimed cutting-edge facial recognition solution, where it came from, how it has been tested and what schools stand to gain.

RealNetworks **********

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Comments (18)
UI
Undisclosed Integrator #1
Aug 04, 2018

Tested with Hikvision cameras, it must be good!

(2)
(7)
UI
Undisclosed Integrator #1
Aug 04, 2018

Thanks for the unhelpful!  I’m trying to set a record. 

For facial recognition to improve it requires a large sampling dataset of those likely to be identified.  Having additional comparative data like geographical location helps. 

I wonder if one benefit will be the access to the dataset created by these systems across the US for the US market. 

(2)
(1)
UE
Undisclosed End User #2
Aug 10, 2018

Very interesting concept.. I think it is smart of their part, one of the chief questions asked is “where has your product been deployed” flowed by “how is it performing”. Following this up with a commercial offering will gain them market share, I believe.

Plus face it Milinials love apple products, so it sets itself apart in that regard as well.  Are there any other comps out there?

Avatar
Sergio Guzman
Mar 07, 2019
Pine Crest School • IPVMU Certified

Does it integrate with a VMS, or is this purely just for Access Control?

Avatar
Dan Gelinas
Mar 08, 2019
IPVM

Hey Sergio, I checked with RealNetworks and they said:

SAFR is being integrated with multiple VMSes. Nothing that’s public yet, but there will be announcements coming soon.

(1)
Avatar
Dan Gelinas
Mar 15, 2019
IPVM

Following up on my earlier comment, RealNetworks just announced that they have partnered with Digifort for availability through their VMS

While this is a step toward international commercial availability that RealNetworks confirmed to IPVM in our original interview, Digifort is a small VMS player with growth challenges, and this represents a small first commercial step for SAFR.

MP
Max Pellegrini
May 20, 2019

hi, this is Max from RealNetworks. We are integrated now with a bunch of VMSs.

Check this out https://safr.com/security/

 

JH
John Honovich
May 20, 2019
IPVM

Max, which VMSes specifically? I scanned through that page and I don't see a clear list.

I did see the screenshots from Genetec which is helpful, e.g.:

I recommend you have a dedicated page that lists what VMSes, what versions supported and what depth of integration you have.

(1)
MP
Max Pellegrini
May 20, 2019

We support Milestones, Genetec, Digifort and a few others. You should request a contact and the team will brief you

JH
John Honovich
May 20, 2019
IPVM

Max, we can contact the team but a basic question like "What VMSes do you support?" should have a clear public webpage answering that.

(1)
MP
Max Pellegrini
May 20, 2019
JH
John Honovich
May 20, 2019
IPVM

Forbes: Rob Glaser 2.0: RealNetworks Reinvents Itself As Facial Recognition Security Platform, key quotes:

Because the data set was very diverse we have one of the most consistent and bias-free Facial Recognition systems on the market. It turns out a lot of our competitors run into a problem where they’re really good at one demographic or one ethnicity and they’re not nearly as good or nearly as accurate with other subgroups. Because we built SAFR with a geographically diverse data set that spanned all the major ethnicities in the world, being bias-free is one of our competitive advantages.

No human intervention required. They quickly became so comfortable that it never had false positives, which was part of how we designed SAFR, so for their community of 400 or so people using the system SAFR just worked.

We’re seeing tremendous interest. It’s probably the largest and most diverse and robust commercial pipeline I’ve seen since the early days of streaming in the mid ‘90s.

As for the 'never had false positives' that's clearly false as the WSJ report shows how they faked the Real Networks system with a photo (covered in our liveness detection report).

This is a fascinating pivot as RealNetworks has been losing money and draining down their cash for many years:

MP
Max Pellegrini
May 20, 2019

John, to be clear: false positives have been never brought to our attention for that particular installation.

JH
John Honovich
May 20, 2019
IPVM

Max, it was in a WSJ article. How was that not 'brought to [y]our attention'? While you are here, can you clarify why the WSJ was able to spoof the system on that day? 

(1)
MP
Max Pellegrini
May 20, 2019

We are talking to different things. The quote from Rob Glaser refers to a school installation for which we are unaware of false positive after one year or so from the initial installation. Wanted to clarify that.

Avatar
Sergio Guzman
May 20, 2019
Pine Crest School • IPVMU Certified

This doesn't integrate with Milestone, does it?

MP
Max Pellegrini
May 20, 2019

Hi Sergio, it does. As well as, other VMSs

Details here: https://safr.com/security/

(1)
UI
Undisclosed Integrator #3
May 20, 2019

Very cool!