Portland City Council Strongly Bans Facial Recognition Tech

The Portland City Council has passed the toughest facial recognition ban in the United States. It’s blocking both public and private use of the technology. 

Boston, San Francisco, and Oakland have also passed laws barring public institutions from using facial recognition. Portland is the first to prohibit private use and the  ban passed unanimously, according to reports.

The new law was established as two ordinances. The one prohibiting public use of facial recognition is now in effect. 

City bureaus must complete an assessment of their facial recognition usage within 90 days. The ordinance prohibiting private use takes effect on January 1st, 2021.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said Portlanders should never be in fear of having their right of privacy be exploited. That is by either their government or by a private institution. 

Facial recognition software has been found to have age, race, and ethnic biases. This leads to questions about civil liberties and misidentification of individuals by law enforcement. 

 In a statement at the hearing, Portland City Council Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty reportedly touched on those concerns.

 She said she believes what they’re passing is model legislation that the rest of the country will be emulating. That’s as soon as they have completed their work there.

Moreover, she said it’s really about making sure they’re prioritizing their most vulnerable community members, and community members of color.

“No one should have something as private as their face photographed, stored, and sold to third parties for a profit.” “No one should be unfairly thrust into the criminal justice system because the tech algorithm misidentified an innocent person.” These were statements from Hardesty as well.

Portland City Council: ACLU Supports the Legislation

In a statement on Wednesday, the American Civil Liberties Union voiced its support of the legislation. It also referenced some of the recent police brutality against protesters in the city. 

They hope the passage of this landmark legislation will spur efforts to enact statewide legislation that protects all Oregonians. That’s from the broad range of ways that their biometric information is collected, stored, sold, and used without their permission. These were statements from Jann Carson, interim executive director of the ACLU of Oregon.

The ACLU also treated Wednesday’s vote as a historic digital privacy win.

With today’s vote, the community made clear they hold the real power in this city, Carson said. They won’t let Portland turn into a surveillance state where police and corporations alike can track them wherever they go.

Portland’s dual bans on the public and private use of facial recognition may serve as a roadmap. That’ll be for other cities looking to carve out similar digital privacy policies, an outcome privacy advocates are hoping for.

“Now, cities across the country must look to Portland and pass bans of their own.” They have the momentum, and they have the will to beat back this dangerous and discriminatory technology. These were statements from Fight for the Future’s Lia Holland.

Amazon spent $24,000 lobbying Portland City Council commissioners against the ban, according to reports. The company’s been under fire for selling its Rekognition software to police departments. Only one recently agreed to a temporary one-year moratorium on providing police with the technology.