{"id":63,"date":"2018-04-13T10:46:07","date_gmt":"2018-04-13T14:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/?page_id=63"},"modified":"2025-05-12T11:09:02","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T15:09:02","slug":"the-perpetual-line-up","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/publications\/the-perpetual-line-up\/","title":{"rendered":"The Perpetual Line-Up: Unregulated Police Face Recognition in America"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In 2016, we published a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.perpetuallineup.org\">year-long investigation on police use of face recognition<\/a> entitled <em>The Perpetual Line-Up: Unregulated Police Face Recognition in America<\/em>. Piecing together the responses to over 100 Freedom of Information Act requests and dozens of interviews, we found that more than half of American adults were enrolled in a face recognition network searchable by law enforcement. Our findings were covered in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/business\/economy\/face-recognition-tech\/2016\/10\/17\/986929ea-41f0-44a2-b2b9-90b495230dce_story.html?utm_term=.ba81c84ceb4b\"><em>Washington Post<\/em><\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/10\/19\/us\/a-virtual-lineups-of-average-citizens-created-by-software.html\"><em>New York Times<\/em><\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/law-enforcement-increasing-use-of-facial-recognition-technology\/\">CBS Evening News<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2016\/10\/23\/499042369\/police-facial-recognition-databases-log-about-half-of-americans\">NPR<\/a>, and numerous other outlets.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In Maryland, our report was on the front page\u2014and editorial page\u2014of the <em>Baltimore<\/em> <em>Sun<\/em>. A state legislator offered a <a href=\"http:\/\/mgaleg.maryland.gov\/2017RS\/bills\/hb\/hb1148f.pdf?mc_cid=ffed3e5d6e&amp;mc_eid=1099afe0f2\">bill<\/a> to regulate face recognition based on the bill in our report.<\/li>\n<li>In Vermont, the ACLU used our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.perpetuallineup.org\/jurisdiction\/vermont?mc_cid=ffed3e5d6e&amp;mc_eid=1099afe0f2\">research<\/a> to successfully lobby for an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.burlingtonfreepress.com\/story\/news\/local\/2017\/07\/18\/attorney-general-sides-against-vermont-dmvs-facial-recognition-program\/488427001\/?mc_cid=ffed3e5d6e&amp;mc_eid=1099afe0f2\">end to the state\u2019s use<\/a> of face recognition on driver\u2019s license photos.<\/li>\n<li>The National Institute of Standards and Technology <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nist.gov\/programs-projects\/face-recognition-vendor-test-frvt-ongoing?mc_cid=ffed3e5d6e&amp;mc_eid=1099afe0f2\">modified its testing regime<\/a> to align with the recommendations in our report, adding regular, ongoing tests for demographic bias.<\/li>\n<li>The U.S. House Oversight Committee, driven by our report, held a <a href=\"https:\/\/oversight.house.gov\/hearing\/law-enforcements-use-facial-recognition-technology\/?mc_cid=ffed3e5d6e&amp;mc_eid=1099afe0f2\">full committee hearing<\/a> into the FBI\u2019s use of the technology, where our executive director <a href=\"https:\/\/oversight.house.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/Bedoya-GeorgetownLaw-Statement-FRT-Study-3-22.pdf?mc_cid=ffed3e5d6e&amp;mc_eid=1099afe0f2\">testified<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In 2016, we published a year-long investigation on police use of face recognition entitled The Perpetual Line-Up: Unregulated Police Face Recognition in America. Piecing together the responses to over 100 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":115,"featured_media":0,"parent":62,"menu_order":8,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":"","_tec_slr_enabled":"","_tec_slr_layout":""},"class_list":["post-63","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"ticketed":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/63","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/115"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63"}],"version-history":[{"count":67,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/63\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3672,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/63\/revisions\/3672"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/62"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/privacy-technology-center\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}