Perfect German Passport Photo
IOL: Germans ordered to stay serious in passport photos — Oh please!
Germans were today ordered to stay serious when having their photographs taken for new passports, wiping away any grins, smirks or smiles so that biometric scanners can pick up their facial features.
Interior Minister Otto Schily ordered passport authorities to only accept pictures taken from the front showing the %u201Dmost neutral facial expression possible%u201D, starting on November 1.
Facial recognition systems match key features on the holder%u2019s face and work best when the face has a neutral expression with the mouth closed.
%u201CA broad smile, however nice it may be, is therefore unacceptable,%u201D the Interior Ministry said in a statement.
Sounds like the software sucks if you ask me. Attention to all criminals: smile all the time and you will never get caught!
discovered by Meetsy
Canadians haven’t been able to smile (at least on passport photos) for a couple of years now. 😐
Mario
If you have to get your passport done in Canada or the USA you are also denied the smile.
This is already the case with Canadian pasport photographs. No Smiling please, we’re Canadian.
I was told the same thing for US passports…
My wife and I just had passport photos taken at the local AAA office, and were told exactly the same thing. Look serious, no smiling.
Nothing new, Canadian Passports have required expressionless looking faces for some time now. Sad really. Punctuates the shortcomings of the software, and makes the world a little less friendly in already unfriendly airports.
I’ve heard this before and not just with the German system. I read that American passports will be doing the same thing. I for one am glad, there is nothing worse then a stupid, fake, goofy smile that often results in any type of ID photo.
This happened right across Europe quite a while back. Here’s the BBC’s take on it from August 6th 2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3541444.stm
We are being asked the same thing in Canada ! I had to provide my 2 kids with passports this year, and they look like murderers in their passport ! I’m so proud…
I think it will take a lot more time to take passport photos for smily people. If biometric face recognition software can not yet match the smily face of someone with his/her neutral face, then that technology is not ready to be released for use in that kind of identity recognition. Too much identity situations could happen, with efficiency concerns included. Should prefer fingerprint recognition means instead.
I think we have the same restrictions in Canada.
We have the same “neutral” passport photo restrictions in Canada, as documented here: http://www.ppt.gc.ca/passports/get_photo_specs_e.asp in the third bullet point for Image Information.
Can anyone keep a straight face after reading this? Hahahahahahaha!!!!!
What about depressed people, does that count as a ‘neutral expression’? Hahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Man, this is a great one!
They tell you the same thing when having your picture taken for a Canadian Passport. They also put makeup on your face so that there is no glare’s or shinny spots on your face.
Old news — Canada has been like that for a couple of years now.
Smiles confuse biometrics.
Interesting trend I just noticed.
It seems that the no smiling rule is applicable to Canadians, Americans and Europeans.
The number of posts saying that Canadians can’t smile would suggest that you have a very high percentage of Canadians reading this blog.
What does this tell us? Canadians like John Dvorak? Canadians use the net? John needs more news on Beer and Hockey? 😉
It probably works quite well… even better woiuld be to make you have a look of incredulity, which is the most likely expression that you will have in an airport as you put up with their ‘security’ policies. Any more 3 year old terrorists denied boading this week? What do they do with all those deadly nail clippers? We had to leave behind a 2mm allen wrench because it could be considered a weapon!
So, if you’re a terrorist, do a little NO2 before you pull the pin?
Oh GEEZ, I thought Canadians were just expressionless, normally!