The band Massive Attack used live facial recognition and tracking on their audience during a recent concert in a powerful warning about the technology.
British group Massive Attack surprised attendees at a recent performance by using facial recognition software that scanned and analyzed the crowd in real time.
Cameras captured audience members’ faces, processed them through recognition systems, and projected the results as part of the onstage visuals. During Massive Attack’s performance of Girl I Love You, faces from the crowd appeared on a large screen behind the band, each one displayed with a label that seemed to suggest the person’s occupation — although it is not clear if that information was accurate.
According to a report by The Daily Dot, the footage appears to come from the band’s June 6 appearance at the LIDO Festival in Victoria Park, London. However, clips from the show only began circulating widely online in the past week.
English trip hop collective Massive Attack, who are most famous for the song Teardrop, has long incorporated political statements about technology into their live shows. The band frequently addresses issues of surveillance culture, privacy, and data.
Unlike the normal use of interactive technologies at other concerts — for example, rapper Drake’s deployment of Snapchat’s AR effects on his tour — Massive Attack showed the audience how easily facial data can be collected and displayed. The performance highlighted how facial recognition systems record, analyze, and store images, often without explicit consent from people.
Reactions about the band’s use of facial recognition tech seem to be mixed online. Some praised the display as a stark illustration of how easily surveillance is accepted, while other fans were uneasy about having their data used at a live event.
“I love Massive Attack, and have been fortunate to see them live, so I get where they’re going with it, but I’m not looking to get doxed at a [expletive] concert,” a Threads user writes.
“One more reason to not leave the house,” another viewer comments.
Gadget Review reports that the type of facial recognition software used by the band remains unknown.
“Massive Attack hasn’t released official details about what happened to the captured biometric data or whether permanent records were kept,” Al Landes writes for Gadget Review. This opacity intensifies the artistic statement while raising legitimate privacy questions about conducting surveillance to critique surveillance.”