by Staff writer
Boom!
A software developed at the University of Stanford near California’s Silicon Valley can figure out a person’s sexual orientation simply by analyzing a picture of their face.
The algorithm was able to tell if a man is gay or straight using one picture and was accurate 81 per cent of the time.
It also was able to determine a woman’s sexuality 74 per cent of the time.
When the computer was given five pictures of a person, it answered correctly 91 per cent of the time for men and 83 per cent for women.
The researchers trained the AI using pictures of 36,630 men and 38,593 women taken from online dating profiles of gay and straight people.
The algorithm was able to detect differences in facial structures that may relate to the level of hormones such as testosterone that foetuses are exposed to in the womb, which may determine sexuality, the developers told The Economist.
Facial recognition technology is becoming increasingly speedy, reliable and accurate.
It is being included in the latest smartphones as a security feature and used by governments to tackle crime.
A facial recognition app called FindFace is already helping Russian police to identify suspects and last week Chinese police used the technology to spot criminals at a beer festival.
However, many are saying the technology could put a lot of gay people at risk – homosexuality is still illegal in dozens of countries around the world, and hate crimes against gays have soared in recent years.
