Little-known tech firm Genvis said on a
website for its software that New South Wales and Victoria, home to Sydney,
Melbourne and more than half of Australia's 25 million population, were
trialling its facial recognition products. Genvis said the trials were being
conducted on a voluntary basis.
The Perth, Western Australia-based start-up
developed the software in 2020 with Western Australia state police to help
enforce pandemic movement restrictions, and has said it hopes to sell its
services abroad.
South Australia state began trialling a
similar, non-Genvis technology last month, sparking warnings from privacy
advocates around the world about potential surveillance overreach. The
involvement of New South Wales and Victoria, which have not disclosed that they
are trialling facial recognition technology, may amplify those concerns.
New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian
said in an email the state was "close to piloting some home quarantine
options for returning Australians", without directly responding to
questions about Genvis facial recognition software. Police in New South Wales
referred questions to the state premier.
Victoria Police referred questions to the
Victorian Health department, which did not respond to requests for comment.
Under the system being trialled, people
respond to random check-in requests by taking a "selfie" at their
designated home quarantine address. If the software, which also collects
location data, does not verify the image against a "facial
signature", police may follow up with a visit to the location to confirm
the person's whereabouts.
Though the technology has been used in Western
Australia since last November, it has more recently been pitched as a tool to
enable the country to reopen its borders, ending a system in place since the
start of the pandemic that requires international arrivals to spend two weeks
in hotel quarantine under police guard.
Aside from the pandemic, police forces have
expressed interest in using facial recognition software, prompting a backlash
from rights groups about the potential to target minority groups.
While the recognition technology has been used
in countries like China, no other democracy has been reported as considering
its use in connection with coronavirus containment procedures.
"KEEP COMMUNITIES SAFE"
Genvis Chief Executive Kirstin Butcher declined
to comment on the trials, beyond the disclosures on the product website.
"You can't have home quarantine without
compliance checks, if you're looking to keep communities safe," she said
in a phone interview.
"You can't perform physical compliance
checks at the scale needed to support (social and economic) re-opening plans so
technology has to be used."
But rights advocates warned the technology may
be inaccurate, and may open the window for law enforcement agencies to use
people's data for other purposes without specific laws stopping them.
"I'm troubled not just by the use here
but by the fact this is an example of the creeping use of this sort of
technology in our lives," said Toby Walsh, a professor of Artificial
Intelligence at University of New South Wales.
Walsh questioned the reliability of facial
recognition technology in general, which he said could be hacked to give false
location reports.
"Even if it works here ... then it
validates the idea that facial recognition is a good thing," he said.
"Where does it end?"
The government of Western Australia has said
it banned police from using data collected by COVID-related software for
non-COVID matters. The Western Australia police say they have put 97,000 people
through home quarantine, using facial recognition, without incident.
"The law should prevent a system for
monitoring quarantine being used for other purposes," said Edward Santow,
a former Australian Human Rights Commissioner who now leads an artificial
intelligence ethics project at University of Technology, Sydney.
"Facial recognition technology might seem
like a convenient way to monitor people in quarantine but ... if something goes
wrong with this technology, the risk of harm is high." Reuters
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