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September 27, 2019 01:00 pm

Amazon Is Writing Its Own Facial Recognition Laws To Pitch To Lawmakers

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Vox: Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos says his company is developing a set of laws to regulate facial recognition technology that it plans to share with federal lawmakers. In February, the company, which has faced escalating scrutiny over its controversial facial recognition tech, called Amazon Rekognition, published guidelines it said it hoped lawmakers would consider enacting. Now Amazon is taking another step, Bezos told reporters in a surprise appearance following Amazon's annual Alexa gadget event in Seattle on Wednesday. "Our public policy team is actually working on facial recognition regulations; it makes a lot of sense to regulate that," Bezos said in response to a reporter's question. The idea is that Amazon will write its own draft of what it thinks federal legislation should look like, and it will then pitch lawmakers to adopt as much of it as possible. "It's a perfect example of something that has really positive uses, so you don't want to put the brakes on it," Bezos added. "But, at the same time, there's also potential for abuses of that kind of technology, so you do want regulations. It's a classic dual-use kind of technology." He did not provide details on what's in the proposed legislation. ACLU Northern CA Attorney Jacob Snow said in a statement: "It's a welcome sign that Amazon is finally acknowledging the dangers of face surveillance. But we've seen this playbook before. Once companies realize that people are demanding strong privacy protections, they sweep in, pushing weak rules that won't protect consumer privacy and rights. Cities across the country are voting to ban face surveillance, while Amazon is pushing its surveillance tech deeper into communities."

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