Amnesty International has launched a global campaign that aims to ban the use of facial recognition systems, which have been reported to amplify racist policing and threatens the right to protest.

Indeed, facial recognition systems can be perceived as a form of mass surveillance that can violate the right to privacy and threaten the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and expression. These kinds of technology are developed by using millions of images from social media profiles and driver’s licenses, without having people’s consent first. The software then runs a facial analysis of images captured on video surveillance in order to find potential matches in the database.

The campaign declared that this technology is only increasing systemic racism and lead to the discrimination of people of color. Besides, it was reported that black people are more at risk of being misidentified by facial recognition systems.

There is the threat that facial recognition might be used as a weapon by law enforcement against marginalized communities.

Hence, Amnesty International is aiming to ban completely the use, development, production, and sale of facial recognition technology for mass surveillance purposes by the police and other government agencies.