IBIA Supports NTIA’s Best Practices for Facial Recognition

The International Biometrics + Identity Association (IBIA) is throwing its support behind the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s “Privacy Best Practice Recommendations For Commercial Facial Recognition Use”. The guidelines were published just last week.

While the potential applications and use cases of facial recognition technology are too varied for highly specific best practices, the NTIA document highlights the importance of matters such as transparency, the development of effective data management processes, and security safeguards, among others. In a statement announcing the IBIA’s support of the best practices, IBIA Managing Director Tovah LaDier explained that the “clear benefits of facial recognition technology come with a responsibility to users and consumers,” and said the NTIA’s guidelines “will help to assure the public that facial recognition is being used responsibly and accountably.”

The recommendations and their endorsement arrive at a time when facial recognition technology is starting to come under intense scrutiny as it becomes more prominent and widespread in everyday life. Facial recognition systems are being marketed to retailers as security and customer identification solutions, and major companies like Facebook are facing legal action over their broad use of biometric identification; meanwhile, revelations about the FBI’s FACE program risk negatively coloring public perceptions of the technology. In this climate, it appears increasingly important that organizations deploy the technology in a manner that is carefully thought out, and the NTIA’s guidelines should prove helpful to that end.

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June 21, 2016 – by Alex Perala