Public attitudes towards the use of automatic facial recognition technology in criminal justice systems around the world

Abstract

Automatic facial recognition technology (AFR) is increasingly used in criminal justice systems around the world, yet to date there has not been an international survey of public attitudes toward its use. In Study 1, we ran focus groups in the UK, Australia and China (countries at different stages of adopting AFR) and in Study 2 we collected data from over 3,000 participants in the UK, Australia and the USA using a questionnaire investigating attitudes towards AFR use in criminal justice systems. Our results showed that although overall participants were aligned in their attitudes and reasoning behind them, there were some key differences across countries. People in the USA were more accepting of tracking citizens, more accepting of private companies’ use of AFR, and less trusting of the police using AFR than people in the UK and Australia. Our results showed that support for the use of AFR depends greatly on what the technology is used for and who it is used by. We recommend vendors and users do more to explain AFR use, including details around accuracy and data protection. We also recommend that governments should set legal boundaries around the use of AFR in investigative and criminal justice settings.

Simulated automated facial recognition systems as decision-aids in forensic face matching tasks.

“…Many professionals have average face identification abilities (Weatherford et al, 2021; White et al, 2014), even when they are incentivized to perform well (Kemp et al, 1997). This work also speaks to the issues that may arise with placing lay people in roles that require evaluation of AFRS decisions, which will likely become more common with the proliferation of AFRS technologies across sectors (Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation, 2020; Noyes & Hill, 2021; Ritchie et al, 2021).…”

“…With these advances in accuracy, AFRS are now used to secure highly sensitive infrastructure, including border crossings (Ritchie et al, 2021). Electronic passport gates (“e-Gates”) are a form of Automated Border Control (ABC) commonly found in international airports (Fysh & Bindemann, 2018a).…”

Eyes on the Streets: Media Use and Public Opinion About Facial Recognition Technology

“…A final limitation is that the study focused on the U.S. public, limiting the generalizability of the findings to different populations. Additional research could build on cross-national studies of public opinion toward FRT (e.g., Ritchie et al, 202l) to explore how media use and predispositions predict attitudes toward the technology among a wider range of publics.…”

“…Looking specifically at law enforcement applications, a 2019 Pew Research Center poll of the U.S. public found a majority in favor of agencies using the technology to assess potential security threats in public spaces (Smith, 2019). Surveys conducted in late 2019 and early 2020 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia also found high levels of support for police and government using FRT to search for criminals but lower support for using it to track citizens or search for people irrespective of whether they have committed a crime (Ritchie et al, 2021).…”

Book Review: Forensic Face Matching: Research and Practice by Markus Bindemann

“…This chapter is particularly helpful by providing a clear and understandable overview of the workings of algorithms, with example tasks where AFR might be employed and rationale behind choosing a specific criterion for an AFR system. Future editions of this volume may wish to discuss the ethics and the citizens’ attitudes to AFR in more detail as with increased applications of AFR, important research regarding attitudes is emerging (e.g., Ritchie et al, 2021).…”