Why Italy Has Outlawed Facial Recognition Technology, Smart Glasses

Italy prohibited the usage of facial recognition and ‘sensible glasses’ on Monday as its Data Protection Agency issued a rebuke to 2 municipalities experimenting with the applied sciences. Facial recognition techniques utilizing biometric information won’t be allowed till a particular legislation is adopted or no less than till the tip of subsequent yr, the privateness watchdog mentioned. The exception is when such applied sciences play a job in judicial investigations or the struggle in opposition to crime.

“The moratorium arises from the need to regulate eligibility requirements, conditions and guarantees relating to facial recognition, in compliance with the principle of proportionality,” the company mentioned in an announcement.

Under European Union and Italian legislation, the processing of private information by public our bodies utilizing video units is mostly allowed on public curiosity grounds and when linked to the exercise of public authorities, it added.

However, municipalities that wish to use them should strike “urban security pacts” with central authorities representatives, it added.

The company was reacting to measures taken within the southern Italian metropolis of Lecce, the place authorities mentioned they might start utilizing a expertise based mostly on facial recognition.

The municipality was ordered to supply an outline of the techniques adopted, their goal and authorized foundation, and a listing of databases accessed by its monitoring units, the watchdog mentioned.

The privateness watchdog additionally focused the Tuscan metropolis of Arezzo, the place native police had been attributable to be outfitted with infrared tremendous glasses that may recognise automotive quantity plates.

Private corporations have additionally been engaged on expertise utilizing face recognition expertise. Earlier this yr, Mastercard introduced a “smile to pay” system that’s supposed to save lots of time for patrons at checkouts. The firm started testing the characteristic in Brazil and said that future pilots had been deliberate for the Middle East and Asia. At the time, the announcement had raised considerations regarding the safety of shoppers’ privateness, the storage of their information, and the danger of crime and bias from automated face recognition techniques.

© Thomson Reuters 2022