Digital image search system and method

A method for matching images, the method comprising:

• wirelessly transmitting a digital facial image from a mobile communication device over a wireless network to an image classification server;
• processing the digital facial image at the image classification server to create a primary feature vector for the digital facial image;
• comparing the primary feature vector to a plurality of database feature vectors, each of the plurality of database feature vectors corresponding to a database processed image;
• obtaining matched twin images from the primary feature vector and database feature vectors;
• sorting the matched twin images based on predicted human perception;
• and
• transmitting the best matched twin images to the mobile communication device.

A system for matching an unknown facial image of a first individual with an image of another individual that is a twin in appearance to the first individual, the system comprising:

• a mobile communication device comprising means for generating a digital facial image of an individual and means for wireless transmitting the digital facial image;
• an image classification server for receiving the digital facial image from the mobile communication device, the image classification server comprising
• means for analyzing the digital facial image,
• means for processing the digital facial image to generate a processed image,
• means for comparing the processed image to a plurality of database processed images to create matches,
• means for sorting the matches based on a predicted human perception to determine the best matched image;
• means for transmitting the matched images and the perception value to the mobile communication device;
• and
• a wireless network for transmissions between the mobile communication device and the image classification server.

A method of matching an unknown facial image of a first individual with an image of another individual that is a twin in appearance to the first individual, the method comprising:

• acquiring an unknown facial image of a first individual;
• transmitting the unknown facial image from a sender over a network to a server;
• analyzing the facial image at the server to determine if the unknown facial image is acceptable;
• processing the unknown facial image to create a processed image;
• comparing the processed image to a plurality of database processed images;
• matching the processed image to a database processed image of the plurality of database processed images to create matched images, wherein the database processed image is a facial image of another individual from the another individual's web page of a publicly available website, the web page containing personal information of the individual and a uniform resource locator for the web page;
• transmitting the database processed image, the personal information of the individual and the uniform resource locator for the web page to the sender over the network.