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Seeing Double
Jim McMahon
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a clone? A few people in Japan will soon find out. A mask shop in Tokyo is selling hyperrealistic masks modeled on real faces. Made with an incredible attention to detail, the masks—which are just for entertainment purposes, not pandemic protection—include lifelike features such as facial hair, moles, and eyelashes. More than 100 people applied for the chance to have their faces immortalized in plastic, according to shop owner Shuhei Okawara, and he paid a few of them about $380 for the rights to their likeness. Some experts have raised privacy concerns, wondering what would happen if someone were to commit a crime while wearing another person’s face. But Okawara has dismissed those worries, saying that a facial recognition developer tried to fool one of the systems a few years ago and found the masks didn’t work. Most people, he says, see them as art pieces. Either way, it appears that the privacy concerns aren’t slowing demand, with preorders for the masks—which cost more than $900—selling out last fall. Okawara hopes to “buy” more people’s faces soon, expanding the experimental project to include those in other countries. “A story like science fiction has become a reality,” the store’s website reads. “No one yet knows what will happen to a world full of the same faces as you.”