About

Don’t touch your face. This is a key recommendation from health organizations to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus COVID-19. But avoiding touching your face is hard!

DontTouchFace.com is here to help. It combines the front-facing camera on your computer or phone with advanced machine learning techniques to warn you when you touch your face. This helps you become aware of when you touch your face and reduce how often it happens over time.

Credits

DontTouchFace.com was created by Marc Stogaitis and Mimi Sun. You can contact us here.

We'd like to thank Ann Yuan, Andrey Vakunov, MediaPipe, TensorFlow.js and Google Research for their contributions to open source libraries that we used in this project.

Frequently Asked Questions:

What happens when I touch my face?
You'll hear a 'beep' making you aware that you're touching your face (make sure to turn on your speakers or put on your headphones).
Can it detect face touches even if the page isn’t in the foreground?
Yes, on desktops and laptops. The best way to run it is to put it in its own non-minimized window (even behind other windows). Here are some tips:
  1. It needs to be in a new window, not a new tab since background tabs don't run (hit ctrl + N for a new window)
  2. Don't minimize the window (having it behind other windows is fine)
  3. On a Mac, don't click the green 'maximize' button for the window you're putting on top of it (that seems to minimize everything else that's in the back)
Does any camera data ever leave my device?
No. All processing happens on your device which is great to preserve your privacy.
How does it work?
It uses computer vision to detect the location of your face and hand and warns you if they intersect.
Are there other things I should do to avoid the spread of COVID-19?
Yes. Along with avoiding touching your face, the World Health Organization recommends you wash your hands regularly, maintain social distancing and practice respiratory hygiene or if you have a cough.

Known limitations:

We built this app in under 24 hours to get it out quickly given what’s been happening with COVID-19 so please excuse the rough edges. Expect improvements over time. Some known limitations:
  • Only tracks 1 hand at a time
  • Can trigger when eating
  • Can sometimes mis-trigger when a face is sideways
  • Can miss some face touches when only part of a hand is visible from the front facing camera (works best if the camera is bit further from your face)
  • Doesn't run in the background on mobile