A casual peace sign in a selfie has become China’s latest online privacy concern after experts warned that the popular pose could expose users’ fingerprints.
In a mainland workplace reality show aired in April, financial expert Li Chang used a celebrity selfie to show how clearly visible fingers in a photograph could put personal biometric data at risk.
Li said fingerprints could potentially be extracted from selfies taken within 1.5 metres if the fingers faced the camera directly. Even at a distance of 1.5 to 3 metres, around half of the hand details could still be recovered.
The programme showed fingerprint ridges becoming visible after the image was enhanced with photo-editing software and artificial intelligence (AI) tools.
According to China Newsweek, Jing Jiwu, a cryptography professor at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, said portrait photos taken with high-quality cameras could make it possible to reconstruct hand details from a “scissor hand” pose.
Four young high school students on their way home after class in China flash the peace sign for the camera. Photo: Shutterstock
He noted that fingerprint recovery was usually difficult due to factors such as lighting, focus and image clarity. However, the risk increases when photographs are taken with higher-resolution devices or when criminals obtain multiple related images.