Banning Government Use of Face Recognition Technology: 2020 Year in Review

If there was any question about the gravity of problems with police use of face surveillance technology, 2020 wasted no time in proving them dangerously real. Thankfully, from Oregon to Massachusetts, local lawmakers responded by banning their local governments' use.

The Alarm 

On January 9, after first calling and threatening to arrest him at work, Detroit police officers traveled to nearby Farmington Hills to arrest Robert Williams in front of his wife, children, and neighbors—for a crime he did not commit. He was erroneously connected by face recognition technology that matched an image of Mr. Williams with video from a December 2018 shoplifting incident. Later this year, Detroit police erroneously arrested a second man because of another misidentification by face recognition technology.

For Robert Williams, his family, and millions of Black and brown people throughout the country, the research left the realm of the theoretical and became all too real. Experts at MIT Media Lab, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and Georgetown's Center on Privacy and Technology have shown that face recognition technology is riddled with error, especially for people of color. It is one more of a long line of police tools and practices that exacerbate historical bias in the criminal system.

The Response 

2020 will undoubtedly come to be known as the year of the pandemic. It will also be remembered for unprecedented Black-led protest against police violence and concerns that surveillance of political activity will chill our First Amendment rights. Four cities joined the still-growing list of communities that have stood up for their residents' rights by banning local government use of face recognition. Just days after Mr. Williams' arrest, Cambridge, MA—an East Coast research and technology hub–became the largest East Coast City to ban government use of face recognition technology. It turned out to be a distinction they wouldn't retain long.

In February and March, Chicago and New York City residents and organizers called on local lawmakers to pass their own bans. However, few could have predicted that a month later, organizing, civic engagement, and life as we knew it would change dramatically. As states and municipalities began implementing stay in place orders to suppress an escalating global pandemic, City Councils and other lawmaking bodies adapted to social distancing and remote meetings.

As those of us privileged enough to work from home adjusted to Zoom meetings, protests in the name of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd spread throughout the country.

Calls to end police use of face recognition technology were joined by calls for greater transparency and accountability. Those calls have not yet been answered with a local ban on face recognition in New York City. As New Yorkers continue to push for a ban, one enacted bill will shine the light on NYPD use of all manner of surveillance technology. That light of transparency will inform lawmakers and the public of the breadth and dangers of NYPD's use of face recognition and other privacy-invasive technology. After three years of resistance from the police department and the mayor, New York's City Council passed the POST Act