🛡️
How can design defend the right to protest in the age of AI surveillance, without sacrificing style, safety, or autonomy?
Preserving your identity while protesting.
🧩
The Challenge
Protesting has always been a collective act, empathy, unity, and rebellion against injustice. It’s a public declaration that people matter more than power. But today, standing up for what’s right has never been more dangerous. Once, anonymity came from the crowd. Faces blurred into a sea of voices and raised fists. Cameras were human-operated, and solidarity itself was a shield.
👁️ Now, the algorithm never sleeps. AI-powered cameras scan every street, every rally, every face. They learn. They don’t forget. They strip away the safety once found in numbers. Your identity becomes data. Your activism becomes evidence.
📊
The Surveillance Crisis
The fear is real. People feel unsafe protesting due to surveillance and law enforcement responses. Cities have started deploying AI camera networks and use facial recognition or emotion analytics at protests. On campuses, international students fear visa retaliation, and many communities are disproportionately affected by racial bias embedded in facial-recognition algorithms. Yet only a minor part of student protesters might really understand how AI and facial recognition are used against them.
🛠️
The Problem With Current “Privacy Gear”
Existing anti-surveillance tools are often brilliant in concept but disconnected from reality. They work technically, but not socially. They shout resistance when the goal should be to blend in. What’s missing is a solution that feels like fashion, not armor: discreet, legal, affordable, and empowering.
🧰
Enter 404 Identity
404 Identity is a modular protection kit for community activism. It merges design, technology, and education into one discreet system.
Standard kit includes:
- Digital pattern download
- Anti-recognition point guidelines
- Region-specific legal and safety instructions
Price: Free | Units: Unlimited
Premium kit includes:
- Mocking Neck: soft textile scarf patterned to confuse AI detection
- Band (AI)d: lightweight, lace-patterned clip (2" × 1.5") attaching to glasses frames
- Instructions & rights flyer
- Community access for support and solidarity
Price: €9
Credits:
Vestino Alice Janet / Hernández Meza / Renata Carolina / Mellado Montero / Consuelo Francisca / Zheng Binbing / Salvado Fernández Ana / Sashena Ixita
The project was realized as part of the Fashion Craft course within the Master’s Degree in Design for the Fashion System at Polimi
