In today’s society, companies are taking advantage of emerging technology such as facial recognition to control and manipulate individuals for their own purposes. Madison Square Garden developed facial recognition technologies to deny entry to anyone they deemed a threat to their events, while voice casting companies enabled scammers to imitate the voice of a grandchild in order to deceive their grandparents. These ethical breaches demonstrate why there needs to be rules and regulation that protect people from the potential risks of facial recognition.
Biometrics are the physical features that make us unique – fingerprints, eyes and our individual facial features. Social media platforms are now allowing tech companies to gather these biometrics from photos and videos we post and sell the data to other companies so they can use it to their own advantage. Scary to think that the selfie you posted just now could be used to control and manipulate you in ways you can’t imagine.
The issue concerning facial recognition goes further than just being used as a tool for control. It could also be used to advertise, spy and retaliate against people who go against the grain. Imagine the damage one could do if they recorded people at an abortion clinic, mosque or synagogue. Patients at cancer clinics could be targeted for advertising or even become victims of blackmail. Furthermore, foreign government or terrorist groups could potentially purchase our real-time whereabouts within the US, leaving us vulnerable and exposed.
It’s no surprise that there is now an urgent need for a reasonable right to biometric privacy. Our faces, fingerprints, and eyes should remain strictly our business and no one else’s. It’s also important we don’t give companies allowances to use technology to control us, keep track of us, advertise to us and/or blackmail us. The individual needs to have a voice and be able to express their opinion on how their biometric data is used.
Fortunately, the US is one step closer to rights like these. To make sure the use of biometrics remains within ethical boundaries, a new federal agency regulating AI could be established. The new agency could ensure people aren’t tracked and recorded in a database, that our facial images are not being stolen for scams, and that companies aren’t coercing us into selling access to our biometrics. This agency could also help limit algorithmic misinformation, protect copyrighted material being used to train generative AI, and reduce the massive-scale experimentation being conducted by Big Tech companies on innocent individuals.
Prof. Cynthia Rudin from Duke University is a computer science professor and artificial intelligence scholar and Lance Browne from East Chapel Hill High School is an intern and strong voice on the importance of protectings people from unethical facial recognition use. Both have taken matters into their own hands and have advocated for a reasonable right to biometric privacy before it’s too late.
It’s time we get serious about putting in place solid biometric privacy rights and regulations. Companies must be held accountable when it comes to technology that can disrupt our day-to-day lives. Protecting ourselves and those around us not just now, but in the future, is an undertaking that should not be taken lightly.
