The Biometric Mirror, the only one of its kind in the world, is tucked away in a foyer at the University of Melbourne.

It's not very impressive-looking: just a screen mounted on a wall and a camera with two LED lights like little squinty eyes. What these eyes can see is the impressive part.

Impressive, and worrying. The Biometric Mirror is an artificial intelligence (AI) program that's learned to read my face the same way a human does.

It has been programmed to read faces based on thousands of photos of people that were assessed and ranked by humans according to 14 characteristics, from gender, age and ethnicity to attractiveness, weirdness and emotional stability.

Yes, it'll tell me if I'm weird. Also, my attractiveness and emotional stability.

Here's an example of the results screen (minus the face, of course) sent through by the university's PR earlier in the week.

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So the university has set up a 'mirror' that can peer into the depths of your character and just absolutely burn your confidence. The question is: why?

'Is this really the future that we want?'

Dr Niels Wouters is the lead researcher. He's a digital media specialist with the university's Centre for Social Natural User Interfaces, as well as with Science Gallery Melbourne - a venue for engaging young people with arts and science.

He's also, he says, according to the Biometric Mirror, a little more aggressive-looking on Monday mornings and happier-looking on Friday evenings.

"There's a very urgent need for a discussion around the ethics of artificial intelligence and ethics of algorithms in general to be held but very often this discussion is led by ethicists or academics with very little inclusion of the public," Dr Wouters says.

Is this really the future that we want? Why is it the future that we want or why is it not the future that we want?

Rather than some mad scientist attempt to realise a Black Mirror episode where everyone is being constantly scanned for signs of 'weirdness' and 'emotional instability', this is a project to question the ethics of such technology.

As Dr Wouters points out, this is not too far away.

Facial recognition is already being used by police departments, most notably in China, which has announced plans to build an overarching surveillance network that is "omnipresent, completely connected, always on and fully controllable".

In Australia, legislation to create a national database of faces and other biometric markers is currently before parliament. For the recent Commonwealth Games, Queensland police matched drivers' licence photos with security footage.

City of Perth has deployed facial recognition cameras in the Perth CBD to identity what it calls "troublemakers" on a "Black Watchlist" that it controls. Critics say the local government is trying to be a shadow police force.

Aside from the dystopian scenario of an all-powerful government (Minority Report), there's the dystopian scenario of an all-powerful corporation (Bladerunner)

Facebook, already under scrutiny for data-mining practices, has rolled out facial recognition tools that consumer and privacy groups say violates user consent. The technology can be used to remotely identify people without their knowledge.

That's scary, but also not surprising. What I hadn't expected was that facial recognition technology was already being used down at the mall.

"It definitely is in place in shopping centres," Dr Woulters says.

"Even in Australia your facial image will be taken and it will be analysed by a process somewhere in a black box you don't have access to.

"This is absolutely happening in Australia."

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Whatsapp Facial recognition technology used as airline passengers arrive at a terminal, 2009

What's going on in that black box isn't so clear, but Dr Wouters believes at some point it could look a lot like the Biometric Mirror: we're talking about a door camera detecting the emotions, age, gender and demographics of the people passing through the entrance.

And if you have all-powerful corporations and mighty, high-tech mall cops, at some point Pam from HR is going to start using the mirror as well.

"What if you look quite aggressive one day and that will be sent on to a future employer and that will automatically exclude you from management positions," Dr Wouter says.

"Technically this is all really, really possible."

'Should I smile?'

In order to be scanned, judged and potentially humiliated by the Biometric Mirror, I have to stand in front of the screen and raise a hand to give my consent.

I ask Dr Wouters if I should smile for the camera.

"Smiling definitely helps," he says.

Smiling helps in society anyway, but smiling also helps to affect the output of our algorithm.

To withdraw consent, I just need to put my hand over my face.

This reminds me how few times we are asked for our consent when it comes to new mass-surveillance technology that affects our privacy and freedoms. No-one is ever asked to raise their hand in order to be captured on CCTV.

As I stand before the Biometric Mirror, it matches the characteristics of my face with an open, publicly accessible database of 10,000 facial photos that have been classified by humans around the world for their psychological traits.

Facial recognition software is only ever as good as its database of faces, and, in this case, the subjective judgements of the humans who classified the faces.

Facial recognition software used by UK police, for example, has been found to discriminate based on race and gender. The error rate for dark-skinned women was 43 times higher than for lighter-skinned men, because the database was mainly white dudes. As a result, dark-skinned women were more likely to be plucked from a crowd and questioned about crimes they did not commit.

The big reveal

This is what the Biometric Mirror sees in my face:

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Whatsapp Jo's results for the Biometric Mirror.

The figures on the right, under the 'Conf' heading, are to indicate the algorithm's certainty or confidence in the value it has assigned to the left.

In my case, it's very confident my emotion is happiness (which is nice), but not so confident my attractiveness is average (hmmm).

It also thinks I'm a fair bit older than is the case. Thanks.

Words appear on the screen: "You look 35 years old and quite attractive."

"Imagine that I send this to tabloids and they publish your photos and your person details. It may be science fiction but it can be done."

I cover my face to withdraw consent.