UK Ad Uses Facial-recognition to Target Women

If you spend a lot of time online, you're probably used to seeing targeted ads that are relevant to you. Offline is a different story. If you commute to work, on any given day you probably see at least 10 ads that don't interest you in the slightest. However, a company in the UK has launched a special ad campaign that shows viewers a different ad based on their gender.

Plan UK's latest ad aims to raise awareness about its 'Because I am a Girl' campaign, which highlights the fact that 75 million girls around the world are not in school. The ad is a billboard that uses a HD camera and facial recognition software to determine whether the viewer is male or female. Female viewers will see a full length ad with information on Plan's work to help some of the world's poorest girls. Men and boys are denied the choice to view the full content in order to highlight the fact that women and girls across the world are denied choices and opportunities on a daily basis due to poverty and discrimination. Instead, male viewers will be directed to Plan UK's website for more information.

The gender facial recognition advert will be trialled at an Oxford Street bus stop opposite Selfridges for a two-week period and will be opt-in in that viewers will have to approach the bus stop before it scans their face. Though it's quite not an ad served to you based on your specific interests, it represents an interesting development for offline advertising. Who knows, in a few years, we could all be seeing personalised ads based while out and about.

Jane McEntegart is a writer, editor, and marketing communications professional with 17 years of experience in the technology industry. She has written about a wide range of technology topics, including smartphones, tablets, and game consoles. Her articles have been published in Tom's Guide, Tom's Hardware, MobileSyrup, and Edge Up.

24 Comments Comment from the forums

Thunderfox

Rather stupid. If you think your message is important to get out, this is the wrong thing to be using this sort of technology on. Now all you've done is ensure that any man who might have given it a thought won't even get the chance. If you want to make it draw women's attention, just make it pink.

On a lighter note, how would this thing have responded to Michael Jackson?
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de5_Roy

they use facial recog to determine gender? what if dame edna shows up?
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kcorp2003

"75 million girls around the world are not in school" that includes 3rd world countries? i mean it's not like they got a choice that they can afford it. (lazy dads?). Which is sad. Also female ideology is so fascinating to study. I once got hit in the groin for not doing the right thing. uh i can sometime still feel that pain.
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joeblogs

They are trying to say that gender discrimination is wrong by not letting men to see the whole ad? Anyone else see a problem with that?
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billybobser

I'll start my own ad campaign... with blackjack and hookers!
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doorspawn

Hopefully the ad serves both purposes - to make people aware of appalling sexism in much of the world, and to make people aware of the problem of discriminatory technology.
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pyoverdin

Apparently for these people the solution to uneducated girl's problems is anti-male sexism.
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__-_-_-__

illegal in my country. there's a thing called privacy that it still respected.
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K2N hater

de5_roythey use facial recog to determine gender? what if dame edna shows up?Lawsuit.
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warezme

__-_-_-__illegal in my country. there's a thing called privacy that it still respected.say hello to Peter Pan for me.

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