Glass App identifies people by their clothes.

A new ‘human recognition system’ app can identify people in a crowd from their clothing, and overlay their name on the display of a Google Glass headset.

The system, called InSight, is part-funded by Google and was unveiled at the HotMobile technology conference in Jekyll Island, Georgia, last week. It aims to help users find their friends and be spotted themselves in busy places like shopping centres, sports stadia and airports. Face recognition systems cannot be used for this, says InSight developer Srihari Nelakuditi at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, because it is unlikely someone in a crowd will be looking straight at a headset’s camera.

In early tests, the system showed 93 percent accuracy in identifying volunteers, even with their backs turned.