Kinect may figure out your age by looking at you

A new patent has been filed to give the Kinect motion control sensor its creepiest feature since Peter Molyneux demoed Project Milo: the new patent will allow the Kinect to see how old you are just by looking at you. Even more strange, it’ll act as a virtual V-chip censor.

The patent, which was filed in March 2010, will allow the Kinect to block adult content if what it sees are children coming into the room. If there are only adults present, it’ll allow the adult content.

How does it work? According to the patent, “The metrics can relate to, e.g., a relative size of a head of the body, a ratio of arm length to body height, a ratio of body height to head height, and/or a ratio of head width to shoulder width. The metrics are particularly indicative of age group. Based on the age group, a profile of the user is automatically updated with various parental control settings which control access to the electronic media device. Also, currently output content can be replaced by substitute content when a person in a lower age group enters the field of view.”

It seems that body proportion, not something mundane as height and weight, figure into the equations, so very short people won’t be identified as children. There will also probably be an override to block the Kinect from behaving as a strict schoolmarm as well.