In a debate taking place this week, Portland, Maine, City Council is considering joining the growing list of U.S. cities that have banned the use of facial recognition technology. The only place in Portland currently known to be using the technology is the Portland Jetport, where it is used by the airlines JetBlue and Delta,…
A pair of senators from both sides of the political aisle have tabled a new bill that would place restrictions on the use of facial recognition technology by law enforcement agencies. The Facial Recognition Technology Warrant Act — sponsored by Christopher Coons (D-Del.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) — would require law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant and…
City officials in San Francisco have approved a proposed ban on the city’s use of facial recognition, clearing the way for it to become law. First proposed at the end of January, the legislation is designed to prohibit the use of facial recognition-based surveillance technology by city departments, and requires them to seek approval from…
As controversy over the public use of facial recognition continues, Microsoft is following Google’s lead in laying out its approach to the ethics of the technology in a new blog post by the company’s President, Brad Smith. It’s a far less concise and straightforward accounting than the one laid out by Google CEO Sundar Prichai,…
“…it’s funny that Juggalos, who tend toward anti-establishment and conspiratorial philosophies – one Insane Clown Posse song rejected scientific explanations for magnetism – have become de facto disruptors of biometric surveillance just by being themselves.” As police authorities’ use of facial recognition continues to rise – along with opposition to such practices from privacy and…
“IBM is going to release a dataset of 36,000 facial images that will be equally distributed across a range of ethnicities, genders, and ages.” As the competition to develop sophisticated facial recognition systems continues to escalate, IBM is preparing to make a decidedly counterintuitive move, with plans to release a huge dataset for training facial…