Emotion Recognition using Wireless Signals.
New technology out of MIT makes it possible to track heartbeat and respiration using radio-frequency modulators in
a similar frequency to WiFi signals.
The technology can track the emotional responses individuals with a degree of accuracy at range, whether or not they happen to be in view of a camera or other sensor.
This capability might enable a comedian or politician to literally feel the room during a public engagement, or a peace officer to read subdued agitation or panic in a suspect.
The campus security-related capabilities might be substantial also, notwithstanding privacy rights. Folks experiencing a nervous breakdown in a car-park stairwell, a barely-contained rage at the DMV, the thrill of shoplifting, or an amorous liaison in a supply closet, may soon find themselves quickly and automatically rumbled.
One more step towards understanding human brain responses. Human health sector can surely use the technology for improvements.
This will be great for revealing political and corporate skullduggery by normal people. It will be of lesser utility on sociopaths, sadly, who do not feel emotions the same way as healthy folks. However, the ability to deploy this as an invisible lie detector will nonetheless be quite useful in detecting emotionally broken people, and I can see this being extraordinarily popular for folks seeking integrity and forthright communications in business, science, and social interactions.
I wouldn't focus on institutional uses of this tech, as it's going to end up in the hands of ordinary people very quickly, where it will decrease institutional power immensely by making their utility to sociopaths of far less benefit. Detecting sociopaths will be facile, quick, and cryptic, and that will make them liabilities, rather than powerful means to deceive.
Thanks!