It is being widely reported that the US Secret Service has launched an investigation into a project started by a Brooklyn based media artist for installing an app on Macs in two Apple Stores that randomly took pictures of customers and posted them online. The person by the name Kyle McDonald started a project called ‘People Staring at Computers’ in which he installed an app on Macs in two Apple Stores.The app took photos of people when they were looking at a Mac and the motive is to capture the facial expression of people when staring at a computer. McDonald told Mashable – “We have this expression on our face [when we use computers] that basically says that we’re not interacting with anybody, we’re interacting with the machine. Even if there are a lot of people in the room at the Apple store, you’re not interacting with them. If something weird happens, you don’t say, ‘Hey, did you see that?’”, he said.
All the images were fed on his Tumblr account which contained pictures taken by the app. He also held an exhibition for the project a while ago. However Apple did not approve of this and has asked the Secret Service to step in to assist in investigating and possibly procecuting McDonald.
Four Secret Service agents arrived at Donald’s doorstep with a search warrant and took away his two computers, an iPod and two flash drives. They also told that he would be contacted by Apple shortly. This also raises concern of unprotected computers at Apple stores and at other electronic stores such as BestBuy. Seriously I don’t blame Apple for this, Kyle was desperate for media attention!
Check out other pics here.