Face.com launched Klik 1.0 on Thursday, a facial recognition app for the iPhone that can automatically tag photos of your Facebook friends.
The application taps into the iPhone's camera, allowing users to take photos of friends as well as apply "Face Filters" photo filters. But the real magic is Klik's ability to identify friends' faces from their Facebook photos.
Face.com appears to have achieved what Vergence Labs, among others, have begun proposing: real-time facial recognition of a user's friends. Google has also claimed that it could support facial recognition of complete strangers with Google Goggles, then backpedaled after pundits and others began raising privacy concerns. Google's Project Glass augmented-reality eyeglasses prototype notably does not include that feature.
Naturally, Klik users must log in to Facebook to enable the application to work, and the user's friends must share their photos publicly to allow Klik access to them. Finally, the app only scans and tags photos of a user's Facebook friends - no one else - to maintain privacy. "If you're not friends with the person, Klik won't recognize them," the company says.
If Klik cannot correctly identify a Facebook friend, the user can manually place the app into a learning mode, manually tagging the photo and then directing the app to remember the tag in the future. Klik will also guess at which friend a photo displays, attaching a percentage of certainty to each.
"The magic of real-time face recognition has been a dream since we started this company," said Face.com chief executive Gil Hirsch, in a statement. "Developing Klik has proven that mobile real-time face recognition is possible, and not only adds value to the experience of taking and sharing photos, it also adds and element that's almost like science fiction - only this is real life, and in the palm of your hand."
The Face Filters are dynamic, and "look" for faces. As an example, one blurred out most of the rest of the scene, besides the face. Naturally, photos can be shared via Klik or other social networks, and users can look for photos taken nearby as well.
Klik uses the Face.com API, which the company has said only identifies friends using established social network ties.
For more from Mark, follow him on Twitter @MarkHachman.
