Facial recognition technology, a biometric system that analyzes the features of a person’s face and compares them to a database of known faces, has been used by law enforcement agencies for various purposes, such as finding missing persons, identifying suspects, preventing fraud, and enhancing security. However, the technology has also been criticized for its potential to violate civil rights and privacy, as well as for its accuracy and reliability issues, especially when it comes to people of color.
At least five Black plaintiffs have filed lawsuits against law enforcement agencies in the US, claiming they were wrongly arrested and jailed based on faulty facial recognition matches generated by the agencies’ systems. The lawsuits have raised awareness and sparked debate about the need for more regulation, oversight, and accountability of facial recognition technology, as well as the ethical and social implications of its use.
One of the plaintiffs is Randal Quran Reid, a Georgia man who was arrested in February 2020 by a Louisiana sheriff’s detective who had used facial recognition technology to identify him as a suspect in a theft case. Reid was held in jail for several days before he was released without charges. He is suing the detective and the sheriff for violating his civil rights and privacy.
“I was terrified. I didn’t know what was going on or why I was being arrested. They treated me like a criminal and I felt powerless,” Reid said.
Reid’s lawyer, Nathan Freed Wessler, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said that Reid’s case is not an isolated incident, but part of a pattern of racial bias and error in facial recognition technology.
“The use of this technology by law enforcement, even if standards and protocols are in place, has grave civil liberty and privacy concerns,” said Sam Starks, a senior attorney with The Cochran Firm in Atlanta, which is representing Quran. “And that’s to say nothing about the reliability of the technology itself.”
Quran’s lawsuit was filed Sept. 8 in federal court in Atlanta. It names Jefferson Parish Sheriff Joseph Lopinto and detective Andrew Bartholomew as defendants.
According to a study by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), facial recognition technology has higher error rates for people of color than for white people, especially when it comes to matching faces across different images. The study also found that some facial recognition systems are more likely to misidentify Black women than any other group.
The ACLU and other civil rights groups have called for a moratorium on the use of facial recognition technology by law enforcement agencies until there are clear rules and safeguards to prevent abuse and discrimination. They have also urged Congress to pass legislation that would protect people’s privacy and civil liberties from the misuse of facial recognition technology.
Relevant articles:
- Facial recognition technology jailed a man for days. His lawsuit joins others from Black plaintiffs, ABC News, September 25, 2023
- The new lawsuit that shows facial recognition is officially a civil rights issue, MIT Technology Review, April 14, 2021
- Algorithmic Injustice? Racial bias and facial recognition, PBS, May 5, 2021
- Wrongful arrest exposes racial bias in facial recognition technology used by Detroit police, CBS News, November 19, 2020