---
title: "Hackers Dupe Facial Recognition Systems With Creepy Mask"
description: "Researchers were able to easily fool facial recognition systems at a variety of places, including banks, border crossings, and airports using a mask."
date: "2019-12-12"
modified: "2019-12-12"
authors:
  - name: "Victor Tangermann"
    job_title: "Senior Editor"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/hackers-dupe-facial-recognition-mask"
categories:
  - "Artificial Intelligence"
  - "Facial recognition"
tags:
  - "ai"
  - "artificial intelligence"
  - "facial recognition"
  - "the digest"
---

# Hackers Dupe Facial Recognition Systems With Creepy Mask

![Researchers were able to easily fool facial recognition systems at a variety of places, including banks, border crossings, and airports using a mask.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/hackers-dupe-facial-recognition-systems-with-plastic-mask.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: Kneron\</em\>*

## Duped

Researchers at the AI firm Kneron were able to easily fool facial recognition systems at a variety of high security locations — including banks, border crossing checkpoints, and airports — using a high quality mask, [*Fortune* reports](<https://fortune.com/2019/12/12/airport-bank-facial-recognition-systems-fooled/>).

They suggest that anybody with the capability of creating such a mask could easily fool these systems as well — a grave reality check for widespread facial recognition tech.

## Masked Vigilante

Using the mask, the researchers fooled payment systems by Chinese tech giants Alibaba and WeChat. Some systems were even easier to fool than that — they managed to get through a self-boarding terminal at Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands by using a picture of a face on a phone screen.

The mask the researchers used was a scan of somebody who was already registered in the systems they were attempting to fool.

## Sub-Par

They did concede that it was a specialty mask from Japan, making it less likely that others could replicate their experiment, according to *Fortune*.

"This shows the threat to the privacy of users with sub-par facial recognition that is masquerading as 'AI'." Kneron's CEO Albert Liu told *Fortune*. "The technology is available to fix these issues but firms have not upgraded it. They are taking shortcuts at the expense of security."

Interestingly, the FaceID feature on Apple's iPhone X was not fooled by the mask.

**READ MORE:** [Airport and Payment Facial Recognition Systems Fooled by Masks and Photos, Raising Security Concerns](<https://fortune.com/2019/12/12/airport-bank-facial-recognition-systems-fooled/>) \[*Fortune*\]

**More on facial recognition:** *[Protestors Wearing Head-Mounted Cameras Scan 13,000 Faces in DC](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/protestors-cameras-scan-faces-dc>)*

## Author
I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida.

### Author social links  
[Bluesky](<https://bsky.app/profile/vtanger.bsky.social>)