A Silent Threat: The Dark Side of Facial Recognition
“This is the facial recognition technology nightmare scenario that we have been worried about,” expressed a concerned civil liberties advocate.
Following an investigative report by the Washington Post and objections from civil liberty groups, the New Orleans police department recently halted their extensive and potentially illegal use of a private surveillance network. This network includes over 200 cameras equipped with facial recognition technology, which had been deployed to track and arrest suspects without public consent or oversight.
On Monday, the Post unveiled how the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) utilized real-time facial recognition capabilities provided by Project NOLA, a nonprofit based at the University of New Orleans. This technology was pivotal in identifying and capturing suspects.
“Facial recognition technology poses a direct threat to the fundamental rights of every individual and has no place in our cities.”
According to Project NOLA’s website, the initiative “manages the largest, most economical, and effective networked [high definition] crime camera program in America.” Founded in 2009 by criminologist Bryan Lagarde, the project aims to curb crime by significantly enhancing police effectiveness and public awareness.
The Post‘s Douglas MacMillan and Aaron Schaffer characterized Project NOLA as “an unprecedented surveillance strategy in any major American city that might breach local regulations governing the technology.”
As reported by MacMillan and Schaffer:
Police departments often use facial recognition software to identify unknown perpetrators from still images, typically captured by surveillance cameras at or near crime scenes. The New Orleans police advanced this approach by employing a private network of more than 200 facial recognition cameras to surveil the streets, continuously scanning for wanted individuals and instantly sending alerts with the names and current locations of potential matches directly to officers’ mobile devices through an app.
This development came despite a 2022 city law that restricts police use of facial recognition, reversing a prior complete ban. Civil liberties advocates criticized this law for omitting a clause that previously necessitated judicial approval before the technology’s use.
“This is the facial recognition technology nightmare scenario that we have been worried about,” Nathan Freed Wessler, deputy director of the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, informed the Post. “It gives the government the ability to track anyone—and potentially everyone—as we go about our daily lives.”
Since its inception in 2023, Project NOLA’s operations—recently suspended due to the Post‘s probe—have contributed to numerous arrests. Both NOPD and city officials have acknowledged the project’s role in reducing crime in a city that reported the highest murder rate in the nation as recently as 2022. Project NOLA has also been featured in the true crime series “Real Time Crime.”
Last month, New Orleans Police Commissioner Anne Kirkpatrick instructed Project NOLA to disable its automated alerts until she could “ensure that the application’s use complies fully with legal and policy requirements.”
Concerns have also been raised about racial biases in facial recognition algorithms, which tend to misidentify people of color disproportionately. A pivotal federal study from 2019 found that Black, Asian, and Native American individuals were up to 100 times more likely to be incorrectly identified compared to white individuals.
The ACLU warned in a statement that Project NOLA “intensifies these risks”:
Take the case of Randal Reid, for instance. He was unjustly arrested due to a flawed facial recognition match in Louisiana, despite never having visited the state. The erroneous identification deprived him of his freedom, dignity, and incurred thousands in legal expenses, all based on a single image processed through a facial recognition search during an investigation.
“We cannot overlook the potential of this tool being misused against marginalized groups, particularly immigrants, activists, and others who might only be guilty of dissent or opposing governmental policies,” stated Alanah Odoms, executive director of the ACLU of Louisiana. “These individuals could be secretly added to Project NOLA’s watchlist without public awareness or any accountability from the police.”
“Facial recognition technology poses a direct threat to the fundamental rights of every individual and has no place in our cities,” Odoms declared. “We urge the New Orleans Police Department and the city of New Orleans to permanently cease this program and end all use of live-feed facial recognition technology.”
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