Argument: Facial recognition techFacial-Recognition Technology: Closer to Utopia Than Dystopia
Is facial recognition technology ushering in the age of Big Brother, allowing the government to monitor what we do everywhere we do it? “This is the image that the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF), and a host of other alarmists are attempting to conjure in the minds of the media, elected officials, and the American public,” Robert Atkinson writes. But with the right regulations, “Americans can be safer and have more convenience with little or no reduction of our precious civil liberties.”
We have all heard the stories: Local authorities have installed cameras operating facial-recognition technology on street corners, in shopping malls, even in office buildings. Robert D. Atkinson writes in National Review that, moreover, the software on which these systems rely is biased, generating high rates of false-positive matches, particularly for minorities. And law enforcement is using those matches, even false ones, to prosecute and imprison innocent people.
Atkinson adds:
Does this sound like a dystopian nightmare, perhaps something that would be imposed on the Uyghurs in China? In fact, this is the image that the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF), and a host of other alarmists are attempting to conjure in the minds of the media, elected officials, and the American public. According to them, rapacious technology companies and prying authorities are installing facial-recognition software without rules or guidelines, rapidly creating an Orwellian surveillance state. Only complete bans, it is said, will keep us free.
While that dire narrative makes for good press and does wonders to generate fear and opposition — exactly what these groups want — it is completely misleading.
The reality is that the use of facial-recognition technology, at least in democratic, rule-of-law nations such as those in Europe and the United States, will be far more utopian than dystopian, making our lives easier and safer. To understand why, it’s worth considering some plausible scenarios and asking how existing law might easily be modernized to prevent abuse, particularly surveillance of innocent Americans.
“We shouldn’t let alarmists cap the opportunities that facial-recognition technology can hold,” Atkinson concludes. “With the right commercial and governmental rules restricting its use, Americans can be safer and have more convenience with little or no reduction of our precious civil liberties.”
