Amazon stops police which consists of face-recognition tech for just one year
11 June, 2020
Amazon on Wednesday announced a good one-time ban on letting law enforcement use its facial reputation technology, calling for strong federal government regulations for its ethical use.
The moratorium employs repeato build up racial justice groups for Amazon's cloud computing unit to avoid providing police and immigration officials with tools that works extremely well to unfairly target persons based on race.
"We're implementing a one-year moratorium on police usage of Amazon's facial reputation technology," the Seattle-established computing and retail titan explained in a blog post.
"We hope this one-calendar year moratorium might provide Congress enough time to put into practice appropriate guidelines, and we stand prepared to help if requested."
The announcement came after a coalition of racial justice groups this week launched an online petition calling for Amazon to cut all ties with police and US immigration officials.
The petition takes aim at Amazon Web Companies cloud processing unit's "Rekognition" facial recognition technology and Ring surveillance cameras applied for home security.
"Amazon needs to examine its structural position found in the systemic oppression of dark persons," said Media Justice advertising campaign strategies director Myaisha Hayes.
Amazon's "surveillance empire" could possibly be used by law enforcement to focus on people by race, making the company complicit in such abuse, petition backers argued.
Ring cameras sold by Amazon are being used for security, but persons can share access to surveillance video with police if they wish.
Amazon said organizations like the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children should be able to continue working with Rekognition to help rescue human being trafficking victims and reunite missing children with their own families.
"We've advocated that governments should set up stronger rules to govern the ethical make use of facial recognition technology," Amazon explained in the post. "And in recent times, Congress appears prepared to undertake this challenge."
Northern California American Civil Liberties Union technology director Nicole Ozer said the Amazon move was welcomed, but a one-year moratorium is going to be too brief.
"Face recognition technology provides governments the unprecedented capacity to spy on us wherever we get," Ozer explained. "It fuels law enforcement abuse. This surveillance technology should be stopped."
IBM this week said it no more sells general purpose facial recognition application and is against using such technology for racial profiling or perhaps mass surveillance.
The century-old technology firm needed responsible national standards regarding how facial recognition systems ought to be employed by police agencies.
The ACLU hoped Microsoft and other technology firms would join Amazon and IBM with moves "toward the proper side of history."
The Amazon announcement came the same day that the brother of George Floyd, whose killing by police sparked worldwide protests against racism, built an emotional plea to the united states Congress to "stop the pain" and pass reforms that reduce police brutality.
One day just after burying his brother on Houston, Philonise Floyd appeared in person before a residence hearing, where he described the anguish of watching a viral video of George's death and demanded lawmakers act to fix law enforcement complications including systemic racism.
The five-hour-plus hearing came after congressional Democrats unveiled a package of reforms this week aimed at ending police brutality.
George Floyd, 46, died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25, when a light officer, who features since been charged with second-degree murder, pressed his knee on the subject of Floyd's neck for practically nine minutes.
Protests -- some violent, most calm -- erupted nationwide in a few of the most serious US civil unrest in generations.
Source: japantoday.com