Published on: April 19, 2024
In a recent interview with SafetyDetectives, Eugenia Marina, the Business Development Director for the MENA region at RecFaces, shared insights into the innovative world of biometric technology. RecFaces stands out as an international leader in delivering boxed facial recognition solutions designed to enhance security, operational efficiency, and customer loyalty across various industries. Marina emphasized the company’s commitment to making sophisticated face recognition technology both accessible and beneficial, highlighting the tailored integration with existing infrastructures to meet specific business needs. Distinguishing itself in the competitive biometric market, RecFaces focuses exclusively on facial biometrics, leveraging top-tier algorithms recognized by NIST for reliability and ease of installation.
Eugenia Marina is an expert in facial biometrics and project sales. She has successfully led and participated in complex projects, gaining valuable practical experience in the application of facial recognition. Her expertise covers the entire project cycle, from initial contact and training webinars to after-sales support, ensuring comprehensive customer satisfaction.
Eugenia is a highly qualified specialist who consistently demonstrates her ability to tackle diverse business challenges. Under her leadership, airports, subways, and government institutions have been equipped with facial biometrics, providing effective security solutions. With a unique blend of technical knowledge and exceptional communication skills, Eugenia successfully manages and delivers complex, large-scale projects. Her results-oriented approach and commitment to mutual benefit make her a trusted partner in the industry.
Can you explain what is RecFaces and the core mission that drives the company?
RecFaces is a leading international software vendor specializing in ready-to-use face recognition technology solutions. We provide ready-made software that offers distinct advantages and significant benefits through its biometric capabilities. Our boxed solutions are intended to reduce physical security risks, improve operational efficiency, provide precise time tracking, and foster client loyalty. Over the years, our company has advanced face recognition technology by offering nine software products. These products are designed for seamless integration with customers’ existing infrastructure and tailored to address their specific business challenges.
Our team comprises highly skilled experts with vast experience in product analysis and development. We are equally passionate about creating innovative biometric solutions. Our team members come from different parts of the world. Despite our diverse backgrounds, we share a vision: to make facial recognition technology accessible and relevant across various industries, including marketing, human resources, transportation, banking, and more.
What sets RecFaces apart from other companies in the biometric identification market?
The market for biometrics is divided into four types. The first type is custom solutions, which are expensive and take a long time to develop but are tailored to the unique needs of businesses. Neural networks are the second type; they are less expensive than complete biometric systems but need a lot of training to accurately identify faces. The third type consists of readily available facial recognition terminals that are simple to set up but cannot be incorporated into a more extensive security system. Additionally, there are boxed biometric solutions that are less widely available on the market than other kinds of biometric products.
RecFaces makes boxed solutions, in contrast to most other companies. Our products stand out from the rest due to their high reliability and ease of installation, which enable the construction of comprehensive security systems. For example, installing our solutions only takes twenty minutes. Nevertheless, the algorithms we employ are included in the NIST TOP-5 and are extremely dependable.
Our solutions are functionally complete, so the client does not need to configure or modify the product before use. Many companies work with various types of biometrics, but we focus solely on facial biometrics, which allows us to delve deeply into the nuances of facial identification, gain expertise, and improve our products.
What challenges do you face in integrating biometric solutions in diverse industry environments?
We primarily collaborate with partners responsible for managing clients’ infrastructures rather than directly engaging with end users. From our side, clients receive recommendations on equipment and installation, along with an open API. In our field, we frequently encounter a challenge where clients express their preferences for solutions in abstract terms, possibly due to their unfamiliarity with technical specifics. As a result, we occasionally receive technical specifications that might be influenced by misconceptions. However, we approach each issue with care and ensure to address any concerns that arise to achieve the best outcome.
To increase biometric knowledge, we have a training center where we teach partners and clients the fundamental aspects of facial recognition technology and system operation and show them the capabilities of our products. We also develop integration plugins for easy connection to world-leading VMS and ACS, which are included in our boxed solutions.
What role do you see AI playing in the future of biometric identification and verification?
There are several approaches to developing artificial intelligence. We believe that in the near future, we can expect the increasingly faster work of neural networks, specifically for facial recognition. Algorithms are constantly being fine-tuned, resulting in reduced identification times and increased reliability of biometric systems. In general, AI is already being applied in a variety of fields, from unlocking smartphones to assisting in disease diagnosis. In the foreseeable future, we may expect artificial intelligence to expand into new domains, making our lives easier and safer.
Speaking about the field we work in, we can be sure that AI will play a key role in improving the accuracy and reliability of biometric identification processes. Traditional biometric systems frequently encounter challenges such as fluctuations in lighting, varied facial expressions, and pose specifics, which can all have an impact on performance. AI, however, has the ability to adapt and learn from large datasets, making it possible to recognize and authenticate individuals even in challenging conditions.
Certainly, there is another side where the criminal community is devising new methods to deceive facial recognition systems. Nevertheless, we at RecFaces are constantly working to strengthen the security of our solutions, as well as to improve our products for fast and reliable facial recognition. For example, our Id-Gate solution performs Liveness checks which help to ensure that the identified person is not a spoof (such as photos, videos of a person, masks, etc).
As AI technologies continue to evolve, we anticipate even greater advancements in biometric systems, leading the way to a more secure and technologically advanced future.
How has the global focus on privacy affected the development and deployment of facial recognition software?
It’s no doubt that biometrics companies must consider the global focus on privacy issues. Sometimes this can cause a variety of challenges, primarily due to the local legislation which should be studied in detail. As for us, we work all over the world, and each country has unique peculiarities for ensuring confidentiality and data protection which are carefully examined by our experts. Thus, we provide guidance to our partners on implementing facial recognition solutions in accordance with applicable laws and regional specifications. Our products include the tools required for data depersonalization and consent processing. In our solutions, different storages are used depending on the types of data, and it is transferred only once it is encrypted. Moreover, we always incorporate what is specified in local DPRs into our solutions. To protect data, a set of safeguards is in place from the partner’s side, such as two-factor, three-factor, or even more complex authentication methods, along with AI-driven detection of any anomalous activities.