Massively parallel carbon-unit-based voice pattern matching

[jim bell]

At 02:54 PM 8/9/96 -0700, Ernest Hua wrote:
>Now what if the FBI had voice detection systems just like the ones
>used in "Clear and Present Danger"?  Now THERE'S a good reason for
>tapping 1% of every phone switch ...
>
>I wonder if the public would mind having a MACHINE do drift net
>matching on voices on all public phone switches in the U.S. just to
>find the Olympic bomber ...  What if the specifications of that
>machine were made public and the machine placed under Congressional
>oversight?  (At least members of Congress would never get tapped.)

Voiceprints used to be doable only with sophisticated, specialized 
equipment.  Presumably, they would be doable today with "only" a PC and 
soundcard, along with some software.  This raises an interesting question:  
Would it be possible to modify speech to remove the identifiable 
characteristics which came from the speaker, and replace them with those of 
some other person.  

In other words, could somebody fake a bomb threat using a recording which 
has been processed to sound "exactly" like some famous person whose voice 
you can analyze?  


Jim Bell
jimbell at pacifier.com