British citizens support police use of biometric identification and verification systems – but they remain skeptical about private organizations’ use of biometric data, new research from the Alan Turing Institute has shown.
The survey sheds light on public attitudes toward the use of biometric technology by UK law enforcement agencies just as the country’s government is preparing a major US$295 million investment into policing technology that will include facial recognition systems.
Conducted by the Institute’s Centre for Emerging Technology and Security (CETaS), the research also revealed that despite regular warnings from digital rights groups against police use of technologies such as facial recognition, more than half of the respondents (53 percent) believe that benefits of biometrics outweigh the concerns. But there is a caveat: All biometric applications should be either explicitly regulated or banned, the majority of survey takers say.
- Masha Borak
