Your Firearm Serial Numbers

A Heads-up for those who like sharing photos!

Google and Facebook have now made it possible to find photos of firearms by simply typing a serial number into the search box. Earlier today, the automotive website Jalopnik published a story showing how license plate numbers are evidently scanned using optical character recognition (OCC) on Google images, allowing them to be searchable using text queries. Using the OCC hypothesis, TFB wondered if this image data mining technique might be able to be used to search for firearm serial numbers. Using images posted previously on TFB with serial numbers displayed on firearms, we tested the serial number search technique. As you can see from the results below, firearm serial numbers are in fact part of this apparent large-scale data mining operation by companies like Google and Facebook.

Interesting read: https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2019/10/22/google-firearm-serial-numbers/

 

Interesting, wonder how good the software is, I looked at my photos and I cannot make out any serial numbers on the guns I’ve posted. I’ll definitely make sure non are visible before posting photos now

 

All of mine fell out of a cesna somewhere east of NY and west of California. I think we were somewhere south of Canada and north of Argentina.

 

If it's driven by AI recognition technology, which it most likely is, then it's going to get better and better as time goes on.

 

Type this into your search box.

 

That's pretty scary, but not surprising. Good thing I lost all of my firearms in that terrible boating accident.

 

Optical Character Recognition (OCR) has been around for a long time. Not surprised to see it used to search social media posts. Also keep in mind that the EXIF metadata of the pictures you take (especially when taken with a phone), can contain the location (GPS coordinates) of where it was taken. There are apps that can strip this data if needed.

When speaking of firearms and the 4 main rules of firearm safety, there should be an equal set of rules when posting things to social media. Once it's there, it's nearly impossible to delete.

 

As a software designer, I recommend not using Google anymore. I've switched to FireFox about six months ago. OH and yes, I have been of FB for almost a year.

 

Sorry to hear that. I lost all mine in a flood.

 

Don't use google, fb, gmail or anything to do with their servers. Remember when something is free, it means you are the product. Duck duck go for a search engine and firefox for a browser. These people need to be shut down but most out there are pretty much sheep when it comes to these things.

 

Hopefully you don't have a smart phone either, or a computer. I'm all for privacy, but imo there's only so much you can do, and just wandering around town there's more than enough ways for someone to track you if they wanted. I try not to be obvious and advertise stuff I don't want to be seen, but personally I don't think it makes any difference what browser or email or websites you visit. If you're connected to the outside world people/companies can find stuff.

 

Certainly, but google gets a lot is revenue from the NSA side of things. I 'm not so naive that I believe we can be on these devices and be anonymous but I try to show at least some sort of push back.

 

The problem is that we've become attached to the Net. You can still be off the grid and be in the Net but that requires discipline and some crafty tools.

 

I never should have taken my loaded gun safe on that kayaking trip...

 

"I lost my guns in a boating accident."

"Sir, you don't have a boat?"

"Well shit. I lost that too?"

 

What firearms?

 

assumed it was common sense if you're posting photos of your firearms not to display a serial# ? Mine were lost on a fishing trip all I could recover was a muzzleloader..

 

You guys talking about Firefox as a browser should consider adding the Ghostery extension. It blocks site trackers, which are the Orwellian meat and potatoes of online spying. You might have to tweak it a little, though, it can be so restrictive that it occasionally messes with the way a site loads. Still worth it, in my opinion.

This said, I am using Brave browser, which was made by one of the original Firefox designers who had a falling out of some sort with the Firefox people. It has the tracker blocker software Ghostery employs built right into the browser. It's all I use, and I recommend it.

 

I'm not a fan of this, at all. Another disturbing thing about fb is they pretty much have everyone's contact information. Even the info of those who have never used fb or their messenger. They acquire it from the ppl who have your info on there phones contacts app.

Pretty sure FF has gone the way of data mining user info too now. Duckduckgo is what Ive been using recently. That's supposedly their main attribute/feature.

 

So I will add another F stuff that has happened and although its damn impossible now to get erased unless..well..that's another topic. What everyone is not realizing is the facial recognition or even the BIO signatures we put on our phones or uploaded pictures on any app is now captured. How FB sends you do you know this person suggestions is driven off your contacts and face. Since FB now owns Instagram and Whatsapp..you already are captured. China AND Google has already done this through the GOOD Citizen credit system. China has a AI using a 500mb camera pixel to identify you out of a crowd. i.e...Imagine your at the super bowl of 90k fans..it can isolate you out of that many. Another point to add is the cloud..anyone who backsup pics or data..well that's free data these AI's can mine. Even if you are not using Social Media.


Just wanted to add this. Not only is this dangerous but for all those who dont know already. Here is a poor man's running someones license plates. So be careful..its almost impossible now.

https://jalopnik.com/google-is-reading-your-license-plates-1839259494

 

Same here. I am in the tech industry and I don't use google, fb, twitter, or any of the social media stuff. Its all intrusive and your privacy will be invaded. Last year my buddy came over to pick me up to go deer hunting. When we got in the truck his phone said it would be 3 hours to the cabin. He did not tell it where we were going or ask it how long till we get there. I guess it determined from location and date/time what we were doing. That is flipping scary.

 

Here in Canada, we sell all our guns to some guy named Mike in Canmore, Alberta. He's buying a shit ton after the election results on Monday. That's all I got to say about that..

 

Yeah, that's going off the towers. If its connected, it will ping towers as it passes. Once you reach a location and determines where you stopped it will calculate all that for you. I noticed it back in August while visiting family in Houston from Dallas. So based off your location tracker, once you start moving from a steady spot the logic starts and when you stop..it calculates the time and distance. This is that locate your car feature. When you park your car and go for a walk in the mall, it logs that location.

 

I typed in my license plate number and sure enough my truck pops up.

 

i use duck duck go and a vpn from norton but has anyone noticed websites slow down or tell you to turn off the vpn if you want to use their page example google, prime video,netflix and a few others.

 

@sunnysideTRD, Is Firefox better? I had trouble with it, but that's been a while back. I uninstalled Google chrome, it was burning my data up .

 

Mike from Canmore.... I love it.

 

It actually creeped me out for a minute when I tried it. It didn’t show my truck, but the first few images were of Tundra Winjet tail lights, which I have. Then there were several images of products I use. I had a big WTF moment until I realized my Amazon username is the same as my license plate. It was including products I’d reviewed in the results.
I went ahead and changed my Amazon username. I hadn’t snapped to having used the same for both. I set up the amazon account long before I had my truck.