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Taking one of the country's toughest positions against the use of facial recognition technology by the police, California lawmakers passed Thursday a law banning the police from installing it with a camera worn for the body for three years.
The legislation, which is now awaiting the action of Governor Gavin Newsom, has been reduced at the request of Newsom by an original proposal calling for a total ban, said Phil Ting (D-San Francisco), member of the General Assembly, author of the measure. Later, lawmakers further relaxed the bill from the governor's proposal to ban the police from using body-scanned cameras for seven years.
But Ting said the bill is still a major impediment to a fast-moving, unregulated technology that is often questioned by accuracy and privacy considerations.
"This is not just a California concern, it's a national concern," said Ting. "It really shows how much freedom we have, and how much freedom do we have when we are monitored at every stage."
Many law enforcement groups remain opposed to the law, claiming that facial recognition has important uses in tracking suspects and other applications such as the search for law enforcement. lost children.
"Think of the Boston marathon bombing, the amount of videos that helped police solve this crime," said Ron Lawrence, president of the California Association of Chiefs of Police. "Imagine how much faster, how much faster we can solve crimes with this technology. This is really the way of the future … and we must adopt technology and not run away from it. "
Lawrence said he was happy that the measure was only in place for three years, but was disappointed "that people believe that law enforcement would use technology for harmful reasons. I think some groups think that law enforcement is using it to spy on the general public, which is simply not true. "
Critics argue that facial recognition technology is not reliable enough to be used by law enforcement, and that deployment on body surveillance cameras without participation and approval of the community places thousands of cameras in the streets with a minimum of surveillance. Some studies have shown that technology is less reliable for identifying people of color and women, raising particular concerns in communities of color.
Ting said that he had focused on the body cameras as they presented the additional challenge of an unstable camera in motion during the recording and intended to build community confidence. He added that adding a surveillance element could undermine the relationship between the community and the police.
"It's good to put pressure on these technologies so that we can have a debate," said Evan Greer, deputy director of Fight for the Future, a rights organization that opposes technology. "It can bring an innocent person to prison. It can deport someone.
The debate over legislation has intensified last month when the American Civil Liberties Union, which supported it, released a facial recognition software test that incorrectly matches 26 lawmakers in California – about one in five state legislators – with photos of identity in a publicly accessible database. pictures of the police. Last year, as part of a similar experiment carried out with pictures of members of Congress, the software mistakenly associated 28 federal lawmakers with identity photos.
Amazon, the manufacturer of the Rekognition software used by the ACLU, criticized the test as an advertising hit and misuse of the software. At the time of the test, Amazon issued a statement read in part "[T]ACLU once again knowingly uses Amazon Rekognition and its image to make headlines. As we have said many times in the past, using the recommended 99% trust threshold and as part of a human decision, facial recognition technology can be used for many useful purposes. "
The company refused any new comment on the adoption of the law.
Another bill that would require retailers who use facial recognition technology to issue a notice to customers to inform them of its use is stalled this week. Assemblyman Ed Chau (D-Arcadia) said his proposal was chosen because a compromise was not possible with the retailers who opposed it. Chau announced plans to hold a hearing next year to examine in more detail the commercial use of the technology.
The bill approved by the Assembly on Thursday, Bill 1215, applies only to cameras worn on the body and does not prohibit the forces of the body. order to use facial recognition on still cameras or in other applications. No California law enforcement agency said they used the software on body cameras, but Ting said he wanted to fix the problem before it became widespread. .
"I think this bill really served its purpose of solving this problem," said Ting.
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