Researchers at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab present a non-networking use for wifi-- as a means to see through walls, essentially making an X-ray vision of sorts.
Dubbed RF-Capture, the technology uses variations in wifi signals to recognise human silhouettes from behind walls. To do so it first transmits wifi signals before analysing reflections in the signals to piece together a human form. In other words, it is a little bit like a radar. It requires no wearable sensors and transmission power is "10000 times lower" than standard mobile phone signals.
The researchers say the technology (or rather, the algorithm behind it) is accurate enough to know who the person behind a wall is, determine how he or she is moving and even trace a person's handwriting in air, all by piecing together a silhouette from the reflected wifi signals.
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