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Criminal or deputies? For the Amazon facial recognition system, the difference is not clear. The service exchanged 28 members of the US Congress for convicts. This would be a proof of the risks badociated with this technology, tested in recent months by police forces. That's what the American Civil Liberties Union (Aclu) said, which led the experiment to convince Congress to launch a moratorium on the use of facial recognition. in Public Security
From Washington to Amazon
A Aclu created an archive of 25,000 photos. He then showed Amazonian technology, called Rekognition, the images of 535 US parliamentarians. In 28 cases (more than 5%), facial recognition found a match (in fact non-existent) between the faces of Congress and those of criminals. The mistakes involved men and women, democratic and republican, white, Hispanic and African-American politicians. But the rate of false correspondences was much higher among black parliamentarians.
They make up a fifth of Congress, but they were involved in 39% of Rekognition's mistakes. Figures that, according to Aclu, demonstrate how civil liberties (especially of certain ethnic groups) are exposed to facial recognition technologies. The symbol of these risks is a name that fights for rights: one of the 28 parliamentarians identified as criminals is John Lewis, now a member of the House of Representatives for the State of Georgia, and in 1963 among the leaders of the march on Washington, next to Martin Luther King
The Risks of Rekognition
"If the police used Amazon Rekognition – says Aclu – it is not difficult to imagine "a future in which people will be" questioned "or" wanted "just because a software has found" a match "between their face and the one present in an archive of criminals. "An identification that, accurate or not, could cost them freedom or even life". A problem that, according to the badociation, may aggravate another: "Blacks are already disproportionately harmed by police practices." And Rekognition could "make matters worse." The organization therefore demands that "Congress seriously consider these threats, put a brake and impose a moratorium on the use of facial recognition by the forces of order. This technology should not be used until all necessary measures have been taken to avoid damaging vulnerable communities. "
The Orlando Case
The experience of the American Civil Liberties Union is not a vast study.But, as the organization's writing, this n & Is not even "a hypothetical exercise." Rekognition has already been tested by some US cities, including Orlando.Just after the experiments in Florida, in May Aclu had sent a letter to the CEO of Amazon Jeff Bezos, expressing "great concern," speaking of "threat to freedom" and asking the group's founder to block Rekognition's offer … Even then, the organization had put the emphasis on on discrimination: "People – read the letter – should be free to walk the streets without being observed by the government Facial recognition threatens this freedom The federal government could use this technology to continually monitor immigrants trying to rebuild their lives.The local police could l & # 39; 9, use to identify political protesters ". No answer came from Bezos. The Orlando police, on the other hand, first explained the details of the experiment, defending the technology and clarifying what would be useful on a large scale. A month later, at the end of June, he suspended the tests
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