Deeplinks Blog posts about Biometrics
DNA can reveal an extraordinary amount of private information about you, including familial relationships, medical history, predisposition for disease, and possibly even behavioral tendencies and sexual orientation.
The FBI plans to roll out the face recognition component of its massive Next Generation Identification (NGI) biometrics database this summer—but the Bureau has six years of catching up to do in explaining to Americans exactly how it plans to collect, use and protect this data. Today we called on Attorney General Eric Holder to do just that.
As we explained in the letter:
New documents released by the FBI show that the Bureau is well on its way toward its goal of a fully operational face recognition database by this summer.
EFF received these records in response to our Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for information on Next Generation Identification (NGI)—the FBI’s massive biometric database that may hold records on as much as one third of the U.S. population. The facial recognition component of this database poses real threats to privacy for all Americans.
The San Diego regional planning agency, SANDAG, has been quietly rolling out a new mobile face recognition system that will sharply change how police conduct simple stops on Americans. The system, which allows officers to use mobile devices to collect face images out in the field, already has a database of 1.4 million images and serves nearly 25 federal, state and local law enforcement agencies in the region.
When it comes to searching the most sensitive part of our bodies—our DNA—the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures should be a strong bulwark, keeping the government out of our most personal and private biological information. But in the last few years, those protections have been eroded as courts throughout the country, including the US Supreme Court, have approved of the warrantless DNA collection of people arrested for crimes—individuals who are presumed to be innocent in the eyes of the law. A new amicus brief we filed on Monday argues that these decisions don't mean the complete death of Fourth Amendment protection from DNA collection.
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