It’s not a scene from the latest science fiction blockbuster, but instead a marketing strategy by the supermarket Tesco in the United Kingdom. On Dentons’ Privacy and Data Security Blog, Nick Graham discusses Tesco’s launch of OptimEyes: a face-scanning technology that targets advertisements to customers while they wait. “This is the latest move in the retail sector to find new data sources of customers to ‘mine,’” he says.
The technology group Amscreen teamed up with the grocery giant and launched the OptimEyes Screen at 450 gas stations. It uses a camera to define a customer’s gender and age, which it does by scanning his or her face, and then targets advertisements based on those demographics.
