Ride the Lightning

FBI Facial Recognition System Is Fully Operational

September 17, 2014

Privacy advocates are not happy.

According to a post from The Verge, the FBI's facial recognition system is now complete, after three years of development. It is called the Next Generation Identification (NGI) system. The FBI will be rolling out new features in ongoing criminal investigations.

It is also rolling out a controversial facial recognition feature called the Interstate Photo System, or IPS. IPS will serve as "an image-searching capability of photographs associated with criminal identities," according to the release. IPS mixes traditional mug shot photos with non-criminal faces pulled from employment records and background check databases. The system is expected to collect as many as 52 million faces. Its effectiveness has been under fire as well as its inclusion of the faces of innocent Americans. For a given face, NGI returns a list of 50 candidates, and only promises an 85 percent chance that the suspect will be on the list.

Alarm bells are ringing – and will ring louder when (as is likely), someone innocent is embroiled in a criminal investigation because of a "false positive."

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