Use of Facial Recognition Technology Is Racially Biased, Threatens First Amendment Rights
Law Enforcement's Use of Facial Recognition Technology Is Racially Biased, Threatens First Amendment Rights
Sandra Fulton
Free Press
The system is a network of various state and federal databases that are generally built of drivers' licenses and mug shots. These databases sweep up millions of innocent Americans without their knowledge and put them into what Georgetown calls the "perpetual lineup." It's the first time in our nation's history that the FBI has maintained a biometric database made up primarily of innocent people.
Law enforcement might run a search on a person while on a routine stop. Officers might run a photo taken from a surveillance camera at the scene of an alleged crime. Particularly worrisome is the fact that some agencies have expressed interest in running searches in real time of public spaces.
This kind of persistent surveillance has serious implications for our ability to simply move through life with anonymity. Even more concerning, it may impact people's ability to exercise their First Amendment rights without being identified and targeted by the government.
While law enforcement has argued that the new technology is colorblind, the Georgetown report points to several studies that have found racial bias in these systems. The most prominent of these -- co-authored by FBI expert Richard W. Vorder Bruegge -- found that several of the leading algorithms were 5–10 percent less accurate when used to identify Black people.
