Facial Recognition Technology Solves Crimes, but at What Cost?
Voice of America
Even as big tech companies such as Amazon limit their sale of facial recognition software to law enforcement, one company has not: Clearview AI, a facial recognition search engine that contains three billion images scraped from the internet.
More than 3,000 U.S. law enforcement agencies employ the software, which uses an advanced algorithm to identify and match faces, the company says. “The way it works is very similar to Google, but instead of putting in words, you're putting in photos of faces, and it will find anything publicly available on the internet that looks like that face,” said Hoan Ton-That, chief executive and co-founder of the company. Police argue that facial recognition software is an important tool in fighting and solving crimes. But its increasing use has raised concerns that there are too few rules in place for when and how police can use it.
SpaceX's mega rocket Starship launches for a test flight from Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, Jan. 16, 2025.
FILE - Bottles freshly filled with beer move on a conveyor belt at Lakefront Brewery in Milwaukee, Jan. 14, 2019.
Health workers treat cholera patients at the Bwaila Hospital in Lilongwe, Malawi, on Jan. 11, 2023.
FILE - A man holding a phone walks past a sign of Chinese company ByteDance's app TikTok, known locally as Douyin, at the International Artificial Products Expo in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China, Oct. 18, 2019.
FILE - David Lynch appears at the Governors Awards in Los Angeles, Oct. 27, 2019.
In this screen grab taken from the SpaceX broadcast the Starship's Super Heavy Booster returns to the launch pad at Starbase near Boca Chica, Texas, on Jan. 16, 2025.
FILE - A sign identifies the Edward R. Roybal campus of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, Sept. 30, 2014. On Thursday, the CDC said patients hospitalized for flu should be tested for bird flu within 24 hours.
A Blue Origin New Glenn rocket lifts off on its inaugural launch at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Jan. 16, 2025.
Police and forensic officials outside Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan's residential building after he was operated for stab injuries following a scuffle with an intruder at his home in Mumbai, Jan. 16, 2025. FILE - Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan arrives for a promotional event of his upcoming Hindi-language neo-noir film "Vikram Vedha" in Mumbai, Sept. 7, 2022.
FILE - World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus addresses a press conference on the Marburg virus outbreak at the Kigali Convention Center in Kigali, Rwanda, Oct. 20, 2024.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches carrying Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lunar lander as the primary payload and Japan-based ispace's Resilience lander as a secondary payload, from Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Jan. 15, 2025.
This August 2024 photo provided by researchers shows a mummified human from Peru's Chancay culture. This image provided by researchers shows intricate tattoo designs on a mummified human from Peru's Chancay culture in visible light and using laser-stimulated fluorescence.
FILE - This video grab made from the online Neuralink livestream shows the Neuralink disk implant held by Elon Musk during the presentation, Aug. 28, 2020. Musk said recently that a third person has received an implant from his brain-computer interface company.
FILE - An Intel chip is displayed during an event called AI Everywhere in New York, Dec. 14, 2023.
In this frame grab taken from video, Israeli journalist Moshe Nussbaum, whose speech is impaired by ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), talks in a studio in Neve Ilan, Israel, Dec. 28, 2024. (Channel 12 via AP)
Nasrieen Habib, left, and Makiya Amin pull their snow tubes on top of a hill during an outing organized by the group Habib founded to promote outdoors activities among Muslim women, at Elm Creek Park Reserve in Maple Grove, Minn., Jan. 4, 2025. Nawal Hirsi, right, goes snow tubing with her family as part of a group promoting outdoors activities by Muslim women, at Elm Creek Park Reserve in Maple Grove, Minn., on Jan. 4, 2025.
FILE - New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez listens to oral arguments dealing with local municipalities implementing ordinances restricting abortion, Dec. 13, 2023, in Santa Fe, NM. FILE - The New Mexico Supreme Court Building is seen Jan. 9, 2023, in Santa Fe, NM.
Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket sits on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Jan. 11, 2025.