Publication: USA Today
A routine traffic stop goes dangerously awry when a police officer’s body camera uses its built-in facial recognition software to misidentify a motorist as a convicted felon.
Guns are drawn. Nerves fray. At best, lawsuits are launched. At worst, tragedy strikes.
That imaginary scenario is what some California lawmakers are trying to avoid by supporting Assembly Bill 1215, the Body Camera Accountability Act, which would ban the use of facial recognition software in police body cams – a national first if it passes a Senate vote this summer and is signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
State law enforcement officials here do not now employ the technology to scan those in the line of sight of officers. But some police officials oppose the bill on the grounds that a valuable tool could be lost.
...
Assembly member Phil Ting (D-San Francisco), sponsor of AB 1215, sees fundamental freedoms being encroached if police use facial recognition tech.
“If you turn on facial recognition, you have rolling surveillance cameras,” he says. “And I don’t think anyone in America wants to be watched 24/7.”