Bipartisan House Oversight Group Supports Facial Recognition Moratorium
There’s bipartisan agreement among members of the House Oversight Committee to halt federal law enforcement and government use of facial recognition technology until civil liberty concerns are addressed. Chairman Elijah Cummings, R-Md., ranking member Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and various members of both parties signaled support for a moratorium at Wednesday’s hearing.
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“Seems to me it's time for a timeout,” Jordan said, calling the technology “virtually unregulated.” There are 50 million cameras in the country making repeated mistakes that disproportionately affect people of color, Jordan told reporters. He also cited an “intimidation” factor associated with surveillance that deters attendance at political events and protests. “I’m going to work with the chairman. Something has to be done. I tend to think” a moratorium is the proper course, Jordan said.
The committee will hold a follow-up hearing June 4 with law enforcement. Cummings told reporters the goal is to introduce legislation after the second hearing that will “put a halt on facial recognition.” Cummings said he “probably” will invite tech companies like Amazon to testify about the technology, as well. Cummings plans to ask Reps. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., and Jamie Raskin, D-Md., to conduct subcommittee “deep dives” on the matter.
“Yes, I think there should be a moratorium, at least at the federal level,” Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., told us. “It’s our obligation to make sure we understand the rules surrounding this.” Massie is most worried about civil liberties violations and a lack of framework for certain police searches. The issue hits a “sweet spot” between conservatives and progressives, said Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C. “We’re serious about this. The time is now for legislation.” Just as government shouldn’t have access to a woman’s uterus concerning reproductive decisions, government shouldn’t have access to people’s faces, either, said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. There’s a lot of agreement, but the question is should there be an “all out” stop, Cummings said during the hearing.
At least three witnesses urged Congress to pass a moratorium, including American Civil Liberties Union Senior Legislative Counsel Neema Singh Guliani, University of the District of Columbia law professor Andrew Ferguson and Algorithmic Justice League founder Joy Buolamwini. “If we’re not going to regulate, we should push the pause button,” Ferguson said. National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives former President Cedric Alexander cautioned against a full-on moratorium, saying potentially beneficial police uses should be allowed.
One of the biggest issues, Jordan said, is that elected officials at the federal, state and local levels haven’t signed off on agreements between federal and regional police for use of the technology. “This should concern us all,” he said. When you have a defective product, that’s a problem, and it has a chilling effect on the entire population, Cummings said. Ferguson agreed with Jordan’s point about intimidation, citing a “chilling” effect on protesters and political supporters who don’t want to be profiled.
Technology from IBM, Microsoft and Amazon produce errors in about 1 percent of samples for white men, Buolamwini said. The error rate is up to 30 percent for people of color and women, she said, noting Amazon Rekognition identified Oprah Winfrey as a man. One issue is that police are using “garbage data” to conduct searches, said Georgetown University Law Center on Privacy & Technology Senior Associate Clare Garvie. She claimed that police, in certain instances, have used their sketches as inputs for searches. Garvie lamented a “fundamental lack of transparency” about operation in cities like Chicago, Detroit, Orlando and Washington.
Alexander initially said he “cringed” at the suggestion of a moratorium because the technology has useful applications. The important thing is to make sure police are trained adequately on morals and ethics, he said. Companies shouldn’t just hand the technology to law enforcement without any training. He agreed the current recognition databases don’t properly represent the diversity of the U.S. population and are inherently biased. If lawmakers consider a moratorium, they should know what the technological benefits are and find a way to continue to reap those benefits, he said.
Americans shouldn’t live in a country where a camera on every street corner is gauging citizens’ emotional states, Guliani said. That the FBI is exchanging information with state and local law enforcement without the blessing of any elected officials “scares” Jordan.