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Democrats Demand Info On Law Enforcement's Use of Amazon Facial Recognition Tool (thehill.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: A group of Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on Thursday saying that the company's previous explanations to Congress about its Rekognition software were inadequate. Democratic lawmakers expressed concern about the potential threat the technology poses to civil liberties in the hands of police. "Facial recognition technology may one day serve as a useful tool for law enforcement officials working to protect the American public and keep us safe," the letter reads. "However, at this time, we have serious concerns that this type of product has significant accuracy issues, places disproportionate burdens on communities of color, and could stifle Americans' willingness to exercise their First Amendment rights in public." In the letter on Thursday, the Democratic members requested that Amazon provide them with results from accuracy tests of the Rekognition software. They also asked again for information on their government clients and if they audited law enforcement's use of facial recognition to ensure that its not being employed in violation of civil rights law. "Customer trust, privacy, and security are our top priorities at AWS," Michael Punke, Amazon's vice president for global public policy, wrote in response. "We have long been committed to working with federal and state legislatures to modernize outdated laws to enhance the privacy and security of our customers by preventing law enforcement from accessing data without a warrant."
I'm not willing to allow the police to seek a warrant based upon any companies facial recognition software until that bull roar is long in the past. Like, decades. Sending people with guns to someone's home, in the wee hours, gets folks killed. It's bad enough that no-knock raids happen at the wrong address occasionally, lets not add to the problem.
You act as if the police are some perfect force that effect only the lives of criminals. That's not true. They violate the rights of innocent people all the time, from the black kid getting profiled and searched on the corner to the middle class white family that has their door kicked in at 4am with them and their children held on the floor at gunpoint because a snitch made up an address or they simply raided the wrong house. Their tech tools are intercepting all forms of communication from innocent people all the time. And you think this power never gets exploited by others, or police themselves, for non-criminal matters? There's a whole range of private activities that are not illegal (nor should be) that can be used to destroy someones life, and the more of that information the police get, the more it gets abused.
Giving police more power hurts non-criminals just as much as the criminals themselves, and the police state of your fantasy used to be recognized as the nightmare for the people that it is.
"Customer trust, privacy, and security are our top priorities at AWS," Michael Punk
This is a lie. None of those thing are priorities if it does not turn a profit. Only AFTER they can make a profit are any of those things considered a priority.
Just remember kids, global corporations only care about getting your money. The fact that you are involved in the process is entirely secondary.
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