Meta on Tuesday unveiled Muse Image, its new AI image generator built by Meta Superintelligence Labs, the company’s dedicated AI unit. The feature, which was internally code-named Mango, is now available for free through the Meta AI app, as well as on Instagram Stories and WhatsApp. Unfortunately, the new model is already causing controversy. What exactly can you do with Muse? It sounds like the use cases are similar to most other AI image generators — you’ll be able to create plenty of goofy, cartoonish images, for instance. If you’re short on inspiration and can’t come up with original prompts on your own, Meta says that Muse comes with “presets” — prefabricated image prompts — to “spark ideas.” However, a particularly eyebrow-raising feature allows users to manipulate another Instagram user’s images with AI, as long as that user’s profile is public. Users merely tag the person, and it allows them to take their picture and use it to create a new AI image. Said one X user after The Verge first pointed out how potentially invasive this is: “Pulling real users into generated photos without explicit consent is a privacy landmine waiting to detonate.” Meta policy states that “people may be able to create content with your Instagram content using AI features at Meta” and that “you will not be notified about content created using AI features at Meta.” Meta claims users “have control” over this feature, noting that there are settings you can use to disable this kind of co-option of your pictures if you want to. Muse has other, less invasive applications. One is creating custom ads (AI has notably crept into advertising over the past year). Another is experimenting with interior decorating ideas — in a promotional video, a user leverages Muse to see what a secondhand
Jul 8, 2026 · via techcrunch.com
Live Facial Recognition leads to 28 arrests in Bradford Wednesday, 8 July, 2026 West Yorkshire Police has carried out a successful series of Live Facial Recognition (LFR) deployments in Bradford, resulting in 28 arrests through use of the technology. The force has been conducting operations at locations across Bradford city centre since the end of February. These deployments have seen LFR used to identify individuals wanted in connection with a range of offences, including those sought by the courts and those considered to pose a risk to the public. The technology has assisted officers in making a number of positive identifications, leading to arrests and further safeguarding activity. Of the 28 arrests made, one man was arrested on suspicion of child sexual assault. Others were detained in connection with offences including assault, drug-related crime, domestic abuse and theft. A number of those identified were also wanted for failing to attend court or were recalled to prison. Chief Inspector Dan Tillett who leads on LFR at West Yorkshire Police said: “Since we launched live facial recognition in West Yorkshire, we have taken great care in deploying the technology in places where intelligence has identified it would be most beneficial. “In Bradford, the technology was used to identify 28 people who were arrested for a range of offences. Several others were identified as being subject to court orders and we were able to check to ensure they were complying with those orders.” “As a force, we’re accountable for the use of LFR and are clear that we are not using it for mass surveillance or indiscriminate monitoring, but rather as a targeted tool designed to support frontline officers.” Inspector Justin Adams, Neighbourhood Policing Team (NPT) inspector for Bradford city centre, said: “LFR is a very useful tool, helping city centre officers to
Jul 7, 2026 · via westyorkshire.police.uk
Economic Essay Contest AI data sovereignty: The case for a local server interceptor in Korean finance The Screenshot Nobody Thinks About An elderly woman in Seoul takes a photo of her bank statement. She is confusing about a transaction. Her grandson told her to “just ask ChatGPT.” She uploads the image. Within seconds, the AI explains the charge. Problem solved. Except it is not solved. That bank statement with her account number, transaction history, and personal details just traveled to a server in California. She has no idea. Her bank has no idea. And until something goes wrong, nobody will care. This is happening right now, thousands of times a day, across Korea’s financial system. We have no infrastructure to stop it. The Invisible Data Leak Financial institutions are racing to adopt AI tools. Chatbots answer customer questions. AI assistants help employees draft reports. These tools are useful. Banning them would be impossible. But there is a silent risk: When users interact with AI systems, data flows outward. A customer uploads a document. An employee pastes a client email into a writing assistant. A researcher screenshots proprietary data. Each action sends information to foreign servers. Most AI tools — ChatGPT, Google Bard, Microsoft Copilot — process data in data centers outside Korea. Even with encryption, Korean financial data is leaving Korean jurisdiction. The current regulatory approach is to tell people “do not upload sensitive information.” That is not a policy. It is a hope. Not Just the Elderly, Everyone Is at Risk It would be easy to frame this as a problem only for elderly or less tech-savvy users. But the data tells a different story. Studies show that people across all age groups and education levels routinely share sensitive information with AI tools without understanding where that data goes.
Jul 7, 2026 · via koreatimes.co.kr
When we started this project in June 2025, concerns, questions, and critical reporting surrounding the current trajectory of AI development had been growing elsewhere in the world, while discourse in Indonesia was still primarily led by the overtly enthusiastic government officials. On social media, local tech professionals and CEOs were happy to disseminate the gospels of Silicon Valley tech leaders. The Indonesian government had granted OpenAI CEO Sam Altman a special “golden visa” recognizing his vision of the future as highly important. A 2024 study done by Rio Tuasikal—one of the journalists in this project—showed that private sector and government quotes dominated 70% of AI media coverage in Indonesia. About 60% of the articles relied on a single source. As a nonprofit journalism organization, we depend on your support to fund more than 170 reporting projects every year on critical global and local issues. Donate any amount today to become a Pulitzer Center Champion and receive exclusive benefits! NVIDIA’s Jensen Huang was allowed to talk on a popular media channel about how AI was “almost like an actual person”: a very knowledgeable tutor, doctor, or consultant that can “democratize knowledge,” The media interview with Jensen did not contain any challenging questions; or at the very least, deeper inquiries into the nuts and bolts of the AI systems and the imagined future itself. Therefore, the main goal for our project was to directly respond to the hype and claims surrounding AI permeating the public discourse with very little alternative perspectives. Through our choice of publishing outlets and events to promote the reporting, we targeted Indonesian well-educated urban populations and youth—demographics that possess the social and cultural power to influence decision makers in both public and private sectors. Part I: Labor We wrote several stories on how AI was reshaping white-collar jobs
Jul 7, 2026 · via pulitzercenter.org
If you’re a U.S. citizen flying into SFO from abroad, you may notice a new process at Customs. On June 16, 2026, San Francisco International Airport (SFO) officially launched Enhanced Passenger Processing (EPP), a contactless biometric program developed in partnership with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that uses facial recognition to verify returning U.S. citizens at international arrivals. Since CBP deployed EPP nationally, average wait times for U.S. citizens have dropped by 25%. The program is now active across 25 airports and 8 seaports, including six international locations, making SFO one of dozens of ports of entry where travelers can move through customs without stopping at a traditional inspection booth. How EPP works When U.S. citizens enter the passport processing area at SFO, an auto-capture camera — staffed by a CBP officer — takes a photo of the traveler. Within seconds, the EPP system cross-references that image against passport photos already stored in CBP’s database, confirms identity and citizenship status, runs law enforcement checks, and logs an entry in the travel record. The entire sequence happens before the officer asks a single question. If the system cannot verify a traveler for any reason, a CBP officer redirects them to a standard inspection booth. No traveler is processed without a CBP officer present at every step. What changes for travelers The main shift is administrative: tasks that previously required officers to manually review documents are now handled automatically, freeing CBP staff to focus on direct interaction with passengers. For travelers, the experience is closer to walking past a camera than stopping at a booth. The technology is available exclusively to U.S. citizens arriving at participating airports, preclearance airports, and seaports. A full list of active EPP locations is available on the CBP’s Enhanced Passenger Processing page, including a location-by-location breakdown.
Jul 7, 2026 · via secretsanfrancisco.com
Figures Abstract Medical intelligent question-answering (QA) systems have become important tools for improving the efficiency of healthcare services, and recent research has increasingly emphasized performance optimization and multimodal integration. However, existing systems still face several challenges in intent recognition, entity extraction, and multimodal knowledge fusion, particularly reduced accuracy in multi-label classification, heavy reliance on large-scale annotated data, and limited support for cross-modal retrieval. To address these issues, this study proposes a medical intelligent QA framework that integrates a dual-layer attention mechanism, a large language model, and a multimodal medical knowledge graph to improve system understanding and response generation in complex clinical scenarios. Specifically, we develop a text-based intent recognition model with a dual-layer attention architecture, in which a global contextual attention module is introduced to capture long-range semantic dependencies and improve multi-label classification performance. In addition, an instruction-tuned large language model is employed for zero-shot medical entity recognition, thereby reducing dependence on manually annotated datasets. Building on this foundation, we construct a multimodal medical knowledge graph comprising more than 15,000 associated medical images and develop a visualization-oriented retrieval interface using Flask and ECharts. Experimental results show that the proposed intent recognition model achieves a peak Micro-F1 of 94.42% on multiple benchmark datasets, outperforming several baseline methods. The LLM-based entity recognition module achieved competitive recall in medical entity extraction, demonstrating strong capability in identifying medical entities. User evaluation results further indicate that the system is effective and practical across a variety of medical query types. This study provides a feasible framework for advancing medical QA systems through improved intent recognition, low-resource entity extraction, and multimodal knowledge integration. Citation: Qiu G, Yuan Q, Wang Y, Qu P, Jia W (2026) Enhancing medical Q&A systems with multimodal knowledge graphs and dual-layer attention mechanisms. PLoS One 21(7): e0353112. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0353112 Editor: Qinglin Meng, State Grid
Jul 7, 2026 · via journals.plos.org
The EU has rejected calls by airports and airlines to suspend the implementation of new fingerprinting and facial recognition border controls even though it admits there are “20 difficult spots” with queue chaos. With only a week to go before the peak summer holiday season starts, EU officials said the new entry/exit system (EES) was “not perfect” but it would tell travel industry representatives that a full suspension was “not needed” and “not possible”. Under the EES, non-EU passengers have to register fingerprints and facial images the first time they enter the Schengen zone and then have their biometrics verified every time they leave and re-enter. Airlines and airport representatives and the International Air Transport Association (Iata) last week demanded a suspension of the new controls until next summer amid fears of chaos in holiday hotspots. Iata said passengers were experiencing “delays and missed connections” in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece and Belgium, while last week Ryanair warned of “queue chaos” in airports including popular holiday destinations such as Alicante, Málaga and Palma. However, EU officials say it is impossible to have the system open in some countries and not in others as it would lead to the “unfortunate situation of travellers stranded at border crossings”. This could happen, for example, if a passenger from Britain entered the Schengen area at a border where the new controls were operational but left via a border where they were not. In this instance they would be at risk of being registered as overstaying their 90-day travel allowance in any 180-day period and refused entry on a future trip. The EU is also reportedly delaying the introduction of a separate pre-authorisation visa system known as the European travel information and authorisation system, similar to the US Esta system, according to the Financial Times. Officials
Jul 7, 2026 · via theguardian.com
BuzzFeed GamesOnly People With Elite Pattern Recognition Can Solve This Color Puzzle Called HuedokuHuedoku #60! A big round number deserves a big solve — think you’ve got what it takes? 🎨Posted 8 hours agocommentFacebookPinterestLinkby Crystal RoBuzzFeedBuzzFeed StaffHi, I’m Crystal, a Senior Editor based in Los Angeles and creator of BuzzFeed’s “That Got Dark” newsletter. Huedoku is a daily color puzzle with simple rules and a satisfying solve. It's like sudoku, but with colors instead of numbers. Sign up here to get notified every time we publish a new Huedoku! Come back tomorrow for Huedoku #61 — and share your score to challenge a friend! 🌈 🌈 New Huedoku drops every weekday at 4:00 a.m. PT / 7:00 a.m. ET. 🧩🗂️ Huedoku Archive — Every past puzzle, all in one place! Comments
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Jul 7, 2026 · via buzzfeed.com
Facial recognition entry returns to Redstone Arsenal gates
Specific lanes designated for single-occupant vehicles only
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (WAFF) - Facial recognition entry is back online at two gates on Redstone Arsenal, officials said.
Gate 1 lane 3 and Gate 9 lanes 3 and 4 are now operational for facial recognition entry. Those lanes are designated for single-occupant vehicles only to help reduce wait times.
Who can use the lanes
Drivers must be registered and authorized in the Automated Installation Entry system to use the facial recognition lanes.
Drivers are also required to lower all driver-side windows so guards can confirm no passengers are present. Vehicles with more than one occupant must use a different lane.
Officials said the Trusted Traveler program remains suspended.
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Jul 7, 2026 · via waff.com
Abstract Image-based machine learning tools are powerful resources for analyzing medical images, with deep learning-based semantic segmentation commonly utilized to enable the spatial quantification of structures visible in images. However, dataset generation and training of segmentation algorithms requires advanced programming skills and intricate workflows, limiting their accessibility to scientists without prior coding expertise. Here we present the step-by-step instructions to carry out automatic segmentation of medical images guided by a graphical user interface using the CODAvision algorithm. This workflow simplifies the process of semantic segmentation of microanatomical structures by enabling users to train highly customizable deep learning models without extensive coding expertise. The protocol outlines best practices for creating robust training datasets, configuring model parameters and optimizing performance across diverse biomedical image modalities. CODAvision enhances the usability of the CODA algorithm by streamlining parameter configuration, model training and performance evaluation, automatically generating quantitative results and comprehensive reports. We show the use of CODA to serial histology by demonstrating robust performance across numerous medical image modalities and diverse biological questions. We provide sample results in data types, including histology, magnetic resonance imaging and computed tomography. We demonstrate the diverse use of this tool in applications, including quantification of metastatic burden in in vivo models and deconvolution of spot-based spatial transcriptomics datasets. This protocol is designed for researchers with interest in rapid design of highly customizable semantic segmentation algorithms and a basic understanding of programming and anatomy. Key points - The protocol details best practices for optimizing training datasets, parameterizing an intuitive user interface for model configuration and architecture selection, and automatically generating model performance reports and quantitative data analyses. - CODAvision is a segmentation framework that provides a customizable workflow for manual annotations to be parameterized and automatically converted into optimized training tiles, enabling users with limited computational experience to efficiently
Jul 7, 2026 · via nature.com
Judge orders disclosure of Clearview AI role in DC facial recognition arrest As law enforcement agencies ramp up their use of facial recognition technology to identify suspects, calls for transparency are getting louder. In Washington, D.C., a judge has ordered prosecutors to hand over more information on facial recognition software provided by Clearview AI, after the biometric tech was used to identify and arrest a shooting suspect on July 1. Marquis Foster, 43, is charged with assault with intent to kill, for his involvement in a non-fatal shooting that wounded one person on June 8 near Howard University. A report from DC Witness says Foster was identified using surveillance footage from the crime scene; his face was then fed into Clearview’s system, which has a database of 70 billion publicly available facial images. “The image of the potential suspect that was identified by the software program was then imported into a Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) mugshot’s database, where police identified Foster from an existing image.” The victim then identified Foster from a photo line up. The reaction from Foster’s lawyer, Elizabeth Weller, is telling: “I’ve never heard of this before,” she told a hearing. While it seems unlikely that Weller is unaware of police use of facial recognition, the process – matching an image with Clearview AI then with a police database, or some combination of such – is the kind of new policing capability that is raising questions about probable cause, mass surveillance and false matches. The prosecution has pledged to ask the police for more information, and the judge overseeing the case, D.C. Superior Court Judge Neal Kravitz, has said they must provide it to the court and to Foster’s defense. The parties are scheduled to reconvene on July 22 to address the matter further. New Jersey case
Jul 7, 2026 · via biometricupdate.com
Zero-Shot Local Document Parsing with Gemma 4: Treating PDFs as Images Treating PDFs as images and feeding those images to Gemma 4 dissolves the scanned-versus-digital distinction that makes every text-extraction pipeline fragile. Fix that. # Introduction Run pdfplumber on a scanned invoice, and you get nothing. Run it on a multi-column research paper, and you get a stream of text that has lost every spatial relationship the layout encoded. Run it on a filled PDF form, and you get the field labels concatenated with the values in reading order, with no way to tell which belongs to which. Text-extraction tools have one assumption baked in: the PDF has a selectable text layer. The moment that assumption fails — scanned documents, image-only PDFs, complex form layouts, anything with merged table cells — the tools fail silently. You get empty output or garbled text, and the failure mode gives you no signal about what went wrong. The image approach sidesteps this entirely. Render each PDF page to a high-resolution image. Feed that image to a vision-language model. Ask it what you need in plain language. No optical character recognition (OCR) pipeline, no layout parser, no template matching per document type. The model reads the page the way a human reads a printed page. Gemma 4, released by Google DeepMind on April 2, 2026, with a full Apache 2.0 license, lists Document/PDF parsing as an explicit capability alongside OCR, chart comprehension, handwriting recognition, and screen understanding. It runs entirely locally. No API key, no cloud call, no data leaving your server. The project thread through this article is a local document intake pipeline that processes supplier invoices, extracting vendor name, invoice number, line items, totals, and due date, and outputs structured JSON. It works on scanned and digital PDFs alike. # Why Treat
Jul 7, 2026 · via kdnuggets.com
Big Tech has spent the last 12 months making steady inroads into fashion, and Vogue Business has been clocking every move. So it came as little surprise when last week Meta revealed a Kylie Jenner-fronted campaign for its latest AI smart glasses line, a wider range of 26 new Meta Glasses styles and one pair co-designed with Jenner herself. Like its existing Ray-Ban Meta and Oakley smart glasses lines, the new designs are developed with EssilorLuxxottica — the group that also owns Prada eyewear, rumored to be Meta’s next collaborator. Snap released its second attempt at smart glasses, the new $2,195 AI and AR-powered Specs glasses, just a week earlier, and Google unveiled the first designs of its upcoming Intelligent Eyewear AI smart glasses a fortnight before that, so it was high time the spotlight swung back to smart glasses incumbent Meta, which first launched its version back in 2021. Big Tech has been borrowing from fashion’s playbook to improve its image, and the new Kylie partnership and glasses line launch is its biggest pivot to fashion and culture yet. Beneath the question of whether Jenner can finally make Meta’s smart glasses cool, there’s a much more challenging question for Meta and its rivals. Is recruiting fashion’s most influential tastemakers enough to normalize a product that fundamentally makes consumers so uneasy? Not so fast. Initial reactions to the Jenner drop focused on one specific element of the glasses: their built-in camera. “Just another way for Meta to spy on you by seeing what you see everyday,” said one Instagram user. “The people don’t want this.” “These should be illegal,” said others. “No surveillance state,” said one more. Similar comments flooded in, in response to Snap’s Specs and Google’s Gentle Monster collaborations. “Booooo we hate surveillance technology disguised as fashion,” one
Jul 7, 2026 · via vogue.com
Hamad International Airport rolls out biometric travel at over 700 touchpoints Passengers departing from Hamad International Airport can now complete nearly every stage of their journey using only facial recognition after the airport introduced one of the world’s largest biometric passenger-processing systems. Developed in partnership with Qatar Airways and aviation technology provider SITA, the new Fast Pass service connects more than 700 biometric touchpoints across the airport. It allows eligible passengers to check in, drop bags, clear security and board their flight without presenting a passport or boarding pass at each step. Passengers can enrol in Fast Pass either through the Qatar Airways mobile app during check-in or at a self-service kiosk in the terminal. The enrollment process takes only a few seconds, after which facial recognition becomes their primary form of identification throughout the departure journey. One biometric identity from check-in to boarding The rollout represents a significant expansion of biometric passenger processing, with facial verification integrated into self-service bag-drop units, security checkpoints and boarding gates. The SITA system prevents repeated document checks while maintaining high standards of security and data protection by verifying passengers once before their journey and by automatically identifying them at subsequent touchpoints. Passengers who don’t wish to participate can opt for traditional processing. The airport plans to expand the service to include Qatar Airways transfer passengers and, eventually, other airlines operating from Hamad International Airport, helping streamline connections for transit travellers. Meeting growing demand for contactless travel The launch comes as airports worldwide seek to accommodate growing passenger numbers while minimising congestion at key processing points. SITA cited research from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) showing that most passengers now prefer biometric identification over physical travel documents. IATA published the results of its Global Passenger Survey last year, showing that: - 85% of
Jul 7, 2026 · via aerospaceglobalnews.com
BuzzFeed GamesOnly People With Elite Pattern Recognition Can Solve This Color Puzzle Called HuedokuHuedoku #59! New week, fresh puzzle — let’s kick things off with some color. 🌈Posted 6 hours agocommentFacebookPinterestLinkby Crystal RoBuzzFeedBuzzFeed StaffHi, I’m Crystal, a Senior Editor based in Los Angeles and creator of BuzzFeed’s “That Got Dark” newsletter. Huedoku is a daily color puzzle with simple rules and a satisfying solve. It's like sudoku, but with colors instead of numbers. Sign up here to get notified every time we publish a new Huedoku! Come back tomorrow for Huedoku #60 — and share your score to challenge a friend! 🌈 🌈 New Huedoku drops every weekday at 4:00 a.m. PT / 7:00 a.m. ET. 🧩🗂️ Huedoku Archive — Every past puzzle, all in one place! Comments
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Jul 7, 2026 · via buzzfeed.com
Sainsbury's, the UK's second-largest supermarket, is significantly increasing its use of facial recognition technology across its stores to deter shoplifters. The move, which will see the technology deployed in up to 200 locations by the end of 2026, has drawn criticism from privacy advocates who deem it a violation of privacy rights, as reported by The Register.The supermarket chain is tripling the number of stores utilizing facial recognition, expanding from over 55 current locations to a projected 200 by year-end. Sainsbury's claims the system, provided by Facewatch, has been effective, with 90% of identified individuals not returning to the stores. This expansion follows trials that began last year. Privacy campaigners, including Big Brother Watch, have labeled the deployment "shameful" and a serious threat to privacy, urging shoppers to boycott the supermarket. Concerns have been amplified by incidents such as a shopper being wrongly ejected from a store due to a facial recognition alert, highlighting potential inaccuracies and the impact on innocent customers.Despite apologies and promises of staff training following such errors, critics argue that mass surveillance is not a justifiable response to shoplifting and that innocent shoppers should not be subjected to such identity checks.Source: The Register Get daily email updates SC Media's daily must-read of the most current and pressing daily news You can skip this ad in 5 seconds
Jul 7, 2026 · via scworld.com
We have a habit of dismissing social media trends as inane and vapid while ignoring the disturbing undercurrent. A few weeks ago I was reminded of that when I saw an Instagram carousel by British fashion personality Alexa Chung. Shared with her 6 million followers, she showed different outfits through screenshots of herself entering and leaving her home on her security camera. Rita Ora commented, “Good angle keep this series going”. Security system company Ring commented, “Fit checks on Ring cam? Next level.” The post caught my eye among the feed of curated noise, a counterculture take on the traditional iPhone outfit photo. Its presumed effortlessness felt intimate and off the cuff. Social media loves that sort of thing. But something about it didn’t sit right with me. The fish-eyed lens and zoom-in and zoom-out icons made me feel voyeuristic, like I was stumbling on private footage I shouldn’t be seeing. Maybe that’s exactly what it was. It called to mind Ring’s dystopian Super Bowl ad from earlier this year. The story of finding a lost dog using neighbours’ Ring cameras and AI tools was intended to pull at heartstrings. Instead, it was a revealing confession of how the Amazon-owned tech company leeches itself on to communities. Its ability to use facial recognition software, not to mention how it partners with local law enforcement, is deeply concerning. On TV, we’re sold heartwarming stories about pets found via private cameras. On social media, we see influencers turn security footage into “fit checks”. In our suburbs, we face hyper-surveillance in our grocery store chains. At the same time, there’s been a rise in in-home CCTV social media content and people modifying old CCTV cameras for personal use. We now don’t blink an eye at strangers being filmed in public. Taken individually, we
Jul 7, 2026 · via theguardian.com
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Jul 7, 2026 · via facebook.com
SIA Opens Applications for Four Youth Recognition Programs The Security Industry Association is offering awards and educational scholarships to support emerging professionals and students. - By Jesse Jacobs - Jul 06, 2026 The Security Industry Association has opened the application and nomination process for four of its premier workforce development initiatives aimed at emerging security professionals and students. The 2026 programs include the annual 25 On the RISE awards alongside three specialized educational scholarships. According to association leadership, the initiatives are designed to provide financial assistance and networking access to help younger industry professionals further their career goals. The 25 On the RISE award program, organized by the association’s RISE community, honors 25 professionals under the age of 40 or with fewer than two years of industry experience. Winners are recognized for advancements in diversity, innovation and corporate impact, and receive funding to attend the Securing New Ground conference in New York City. The Denis R. Hébert Identity Management Scholarship, named after the former SIA board chair, provides two $5,000 scholarships to young professionals at member companies. The funds must be applied toward post-secondary education, certifications or training programs specifically within the identity management sector. The James Rothstein Business Scholarship, named for another past SIA chair, funds conference passes and travel expenses for students and RISE community members to attend the executive-level Securing New Ground conference. The SIA–SecuritySpecifiers Young Consultants Scholarship supports security consultants, designers and specifiers aged 35 or younger. Recipients receive full admission and travel accommodation to the CONSULT symposium in Kansas City, Missouri, where they participate in dedicated mentorship meetings with architectural and engineering program sponsors. Association officials stated that the combined programs are part of a broader, long-term industry mission to cultivate and retain next-generation leadership talent. The deadline to submit applications and nominations for all
Jul 6, 2026 · via securitytoday.com
TSA expands biometric identity checks to airline crews Airline pilots, flight attendants, and other eligible crew members are beginning to encounter a materially different way of entering airport sterile areas as the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) replaces Known Crewmember (KCM) with a new facial comparison program called Crewmember Access Point (CMAP). The change is more than a technology upgrade. Known Crewmember was created in 2011 as an industry operated system that allowed vetted crewmembers to present an airline ID and KCM barcode at designated access points. Until now it had been a joint initiative between the Air Line Pilots Association and Airlines for America. Under CMAP, TSA will assume program administration, use data already supplied by carriers through federal crew listing programs, and photograph crew members at access points for comparison against an image held in federal databases. TSA says the transition began June 22 and is scheduled to conclude at airport locations by September 30, although KCM is not expected to formally sunset until the end of this year. The first locations were Washington Reagan, Washington Dulles, and Las Vegas. A second wave began the week of July 5 at airports including San Diego, Honolulu, Salt Lake City, Austin, and Phoenix, with 30 additional airports scheduled for later July conversion dates. Those dates remain subject to change. CMAP remains voluntary in a formal sense. Crew members must affirmatively consent before their airlines add them to the program, and those who decline may use regular passenger screening to reach the sterile area. For crew members, the practical choice is between consenting to facial comparison or losing access to the separate expedited lane that KCM provided. A failed biometric match or a random selection for additional screening sends the crewmember to a passenger checkpoint. The program relies on data that airlines
Jul 6, 2026 · via biometricupdate.com