CreepShield Will Tell You If Your Latest Online Crush Is A Creep

What’s one of the biggest reasons online dating detractors say the Internet is no way to meet a decent date?

The high creep factor, of course. And to be honest, anyone who has tried online dating for more than a day would probably find it difficult to totally disagree. Online dating is an incredible innovation, but there’s no denying it comes with its fair share of strangeness.

A little weirdness is either entertaining or mildly irritating, but what if it goes beyond “a little?” That’s where CreepShield comes in, a new service that helps users avoid the creeps and the crazies online using facial recognition technology .

"Criminals often hide behind aliases online, but CreepShield uses facial recognition software to check for facial similarities and brings up potential matches from a database of over 475,000 registered sex offenders," explained CreepShield's creator Kevin Alan Tussy. "We see facial recognition as a tool that can definitely help make online dating safer. While this technology can't identify everyone out there with bad intentions, it's a huge step in the right direction."

To use the service, simply copy the URL of any headshot and paste it into the CreepShield search engine. The photo is instantly scanned against images in a database of convicted sex offenders, looking for a match. In addition to CreepShield.com, there is also a CreepShield Chrome extension if you prefer to research dates on the fly. Once installed, the extension allows users to right click on any jpg, png or gif displayed in the browser and select "Scan with CreepShield" from the dropdown menu.

CreepShield was developed by the team responsible for the extremely controversial Google Glass app "NameTag." The app and its powerful facial recognition technology were big news earlier this year when Senator Al Franken publicly requested that its release be delayed. With that project put on the backburner, CreepShield came to the forefront.

It’s an intriguing idea, and it’s hard to argue with something that could make online dating safer, but the service still has a few kinks to work out. The site’s FAQ stresses that, due to the way facial recognition technology works, CreepShield can’t guarantee its matches. “It is always up to the user to decide whether or not a searched photo contains the same individual as the results presented,” the site reads. And indeed, when put to the test, it seems the searching method leaves something to be desired.

What do you think? Would you use CreepShield to get the deets on a date?