Biometric Surveillance in The News

In the hands of police departments and other government agencies, face recognition technology presents an inherent threat to privacy, free expression, information security, and social justice. Our faces are unique identifiers that can’t be left at home or replaced like a stolen ID or compromised password. The technology facilitates covert mass surveillance of the places we frequent, people we associate with, and, purportedly, even our emotional state.

Communities across the country are fighting back. In the three years since San Francisco passed its first-of-a-kind ban on government use of facial recognition, at least 16 more municipalities, from Oakland to Boston, have followed their lead. These local bans are thought to be necessary to protect residents from harms that are inseparable from municipal use of this technology.

Of the 17 communities that have adopted bans on facial recognition, Massachusetts has 6 communities on the list: Boston, Brookline, Cambridge, Northampton, Somerville, and Springfield.

It all comes down to our perceived biometric privacy.
Shopping at a store, going to school, driving your car, or even entering your own home could mean having your sensitive biometric information tracked and analyzed. Tools like facial, voice, or behavior recognition are being unleashed by governments and private industry, posing potentially serious threats to our privacy and security. Even the doorbell cams so many of us have on our front doors as sometimes made available to local police departments.

Unfortunately, facial recognition technology is known to be notoriously inaccurate, especially when it comes to identifying women and people of color. Other forms of biometric recognition are shown to be similarly inaccurate and plagued by disparate impacts for Black and Brown people as well.

Technologies like facial recognition, predictive policing, cellphone-spying devices, and drones are commonly deployed without the public’s knowledge or consent. These biased and error-prone tools are becoming widespread with almost no regulation or oversight.

Probably the most recent use of facial recognition technology is that of video taken at the insurrection in Washington during our last presidential election. Hundreds of people have since been identified and charged with a crime.

We aren’t at the point where the technology presented in the 2002 movie, “Minority Report”, is readily available but without some type of standards or regulations, we could certainly be heading there.

In a recent TV news spot, the ACLU of New York is looking to amend their executive law, in relation to prohibiting the use of biometric surveillance technology by law enforcement; establishing the biometric surveillance regulation task force; and providing for the repeal of certain provisions upon expiration thereof. If they are successful, we can expect other communities to work towards some similar types of legislation.

I’m not taking sides at this point because I can see both the good and the bad sides of this technology. I’m watching these developments and trying to identify where we are going today and where we will end up with facial recognition. The next time you travel around in your city or town, see how many cameras you can find during your trip. I think the number will surprise you.