Ukraine uses AI facial recognition to inform Russian parents of their childrens’ deaths

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has resulted in injuries and casualties on both fronts. When available soldier falls in war, their parents are typically informed before bodies are sent home. However, when a body can't be identified, families may never know what happened to them.

In the ongoing conflict, Ukranian forces have developed a modern solution to identifying their deceased enemies. As the number of bodies increases, artificial intelligence tools are being used to notify parents of fallen soldiers.

Ukraine uses AI facial recognition

Reported by Reuters, Ukranian Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov explained the use of facial recognition in the ongoing war. Using controversial facial recognition platform Clearview, Ukranian soldiers are identifying soldiers killed on the battlefield.

Fedorov explained that identification is done to inform parents of their fallen children. Using images of soldiers’ faces, Clearview is used to expose a multitude of information about the target. This includes their names, addresses and relatives. Afterwards, social media is used to inform families.

"As a courtesy to the mothers of those soldiers, we are disseminating this information over social media to at least let families know that they they've lost their sons,” Fedorov said. “[We] then enable them to come to collect their bodies.”

Read More: Over 300,000 Ukranian coders become hackers to fight Russia cyber war

Clearview Border Control

Clearview AI isn't just being used to identify deceased soldiers on the streets of Ukraine. Instead, the technology is also being utilised to scan in anyone attempting to enter the country, just in case they're secretly Russian agents.

Via Business Insider, sources inside Ukraine claim that Clearview is being used at border checkpoints. Anyone attempting to move through the checkpoints are allegedly scanned at the service to check if they’re from Russia.

Clearview CEO Hoan Ton-That told the outlet: "Ukraine officials have expressed appreciation for the use of the technology. Several agencies have used it and already have had successes."

Read More: A Japanese start-up vows to inflict Metaverse Pain with dedicated hardware

Controversial Clearview

Clearview AI has been heavily criticised for the way in which it collects data for its services. The Big Brother-esque service scrapes information of anyone on the Internet and stores it in one massive database.

The controversial service has said that it plans to catalogue every human on earth, filling its database with tens of billions of images. This information is then sold to services like the police force. Clearview has also given access of the database to retail chains, High Schools and even some billionaires.

Of course, the existence of such a service is a dystopian ethical conundrum. Even if the service is being used for a positive reason, should it exist? Should the privacy of everyone on earth be sacrificed for this one tool, especially when it's being so heavily monetised.