RealNetworks announces person identification on the SAFR™ ️platform for people wearing protective clothing against pandemic

Measured by NIST with 99.87% accuracy in face recognition, SAFR incorporates technology created by the University of Michigan (USA) to facilitate the identification of health professionals

SEATTLE, May 28, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- RealNetworks, Inc. (NASDAQ: RNWK) - a global pioneer in video solutions, based in Seattle (USA) – announces today the launch for the EMEA market of a high-performance authentication on the SAFR™ ️platform that allows identification of individuals wearing protective clothing against the pandemic.

With high precision technology (99.87% accuracy) and recognition performance of <50 milliseconds according to NIST, SAFR is able to perform facial recognition even with the use of sunglasses, hats, masks and makeup. In addition, the platform has the ability for individual authentication through an Augmented Reality (AR) marker, the AprilTag (badge), developed by the AprilTags Visual Fiducial System project at the University of Michigan (USA). RealNetworks informs that there will be no additional license fees for using this functionality.

For use by hospitals and health centers, with doctors, nurses and other categories of healthcare professionals, simply attach AprilTag technology to the surface of the protective suit or to a part of the mask. The tag is linked in advance to the information of the professional on the platform and, in this way, smartphones, tablets and IP cameras can be used to perform authentication without the need to remove the mask, glasses or protective clothing.

According to Jose Larrucea, SVP of RealNetworks for EMEA & Latin America, with this feature on the SAFR platform, health professionals can be safely authenticated in several cases, such as: automatic opening of contactless doors; sending a message when a person is authenticated; schedule and in/out record management; and access control to secured areas with the tag.

Additionally, Szabó Zoltán, Technical Project Engineer from Konica Minolta Hungary commented, “We were looking for a solid solution for touchless authentication to provide access to a construction side. SAFR from RealNetworks was the perfect fit as it provides the capability to recognize not only faces but also so-called april tags so you can either use face only or april tag only but also create a 2-factor-authentication by combining both. SAFR works perfectly well with the T26 doorstation from Mobotix and the setup was straight forward due to the versatile integration capabilities of SAFR.”

Also, according to the Larrucea, other countries like Japan and Brazil are already using the SAFR platform with authentication cases like secure and contactless access.

Furthermore, SAFR equipped with the AprilTag function can be deployed on-site, in the cloud, on an internal device, or embedded with a camera.

“The flexibility of SAFR ️helps in the delivery of Artificial Intelligence technology for video analytics and facial recognition to be used by companies in multiple environments; with technical excellence, lean infrastructures and, mainly, within ethical limits and current compliance practices such as GDPR for instance”, observes Jose Larrucea.

Results shown from NIST do not constitute an endorsement of any particular system, product, service, or company by NIST. See results at https://www.nist.gov/programs-projects/face-recognition-vendor-test-frvt-ongoing.

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/0e45909b-0b9f-4a93-b3ac-3a7ac8808d1a