The Dangers Behind Facial Recognition Technology

As technology continues to advance, companies and governments are finding new ways to put this new technology into our everyday lives. One of the more recent advances that has ushered in many debates is the creation of facial recognition software. By utilizing large databases of facial images, the technology can then identify and use these faces for a variety of applications. For example, face filters on various social media apps can recognize a person’s face and impose some kind of filter over it for entertainment purposes. While uses like this aren’t harmful to anyone, uses of facial technology in fields such as security has become a large ethical issue. The software violates basic privacy rights, it utilizes biased data, and it is completely opaque, leaving the user of the technology to guess how the software comes to its conclusions. Facial recognition technology is inherently dangerous, and these ethical issues must be solved to allow the software to be used in even a limited capacity.

The individual issues of microethics directly extend into macroethics issues. Facial recognition software struggles to identify people of color which can exacerbate issues of race and lead to an unfair persecution of anyone who isn’t a white male. False arrests and imprisonments based on facial recognition software can promote over policing, and expand tensions between police forces and marginalized communities. Politically, the increased use of this software at many stores and police stations also promotes a kind of surveillance state in society, which erodes our rights to privacy at the expense of security. Many countries are implementing national databases which collect images of their citizens’ faces along with other information already collected on the individual.

In terms of individual responsibility, the average user of facial recognition software should be wary of the algorithm they are using. Make sure that any facial recognition software you are using does not collect your data on behalf of the company implementing the technology. Be careful using face filters or other entertainment features, and avoid facial recognition software whenever possible. Stay informed on privacy and technology laws going through your government, and write to your elected officials if possible. Inform others about privacy issues and the issues surrounding facial recognition software; the more people who know, the easier it is to make large scale change. In terms of collective responsibility, technologists and those who implement the technology should consider all of the implications this kind of software carries, and use facial recognition software in a way that does not promote over policing or a surveillance state. Such software should also become transparent, and the code and data sets used by said software should go through peer review to verify that it is fair towards all races and genders. This would turn facial recognition software from a tool that works against the public interest, to one who is supportive of the public interest.

J. Ladd, “Collective and Individual Moral Responsibility in Engineering: Some Questions,” in IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 3–10, June 1982, doi: 10.1109/MTAS.1982.5009685.

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