Google unveils tracking tech for in-store eyes

This is sorta scary- billboards that count eyeballs, but that just means someone is going to make an IR array at the right frequency, point it at these cameras and you’ll see a whole new type of click fraud…

Google unveiled an eye-counting video camera Tuesday (May 8) that could enable the company to extend its highly successful online business model to brick-and-mortar advertisers.

The Eyebox was developed by Xuuk Inc. (Kingston, Ontario).

Using its PageRank technology, Google (Mountain View, Calif.) has been able to collect revenue from advertisers based on the number of ads on which people are clicking.

Now with the Eyebox, Google can determine which billboards or products people are looking at in mall corridors or on store shelves, and count them in the same manner that Google counts clicks for online ads.

The Eyebox consists of a palm-sized video camera surrounded by infrared light-emitting diodes and a Universal Serial Bus interface. Software running on an attached computer can determine whether someone is looking at the camera by recognizing the “red eye” spot, which only appears when a viewer is looking directly at the camera.

EETimes.com – Google unveils tracking tech for in-store eyes – [via] Link & more.