Haven’t I Seen You Somewhere Before?

By: Steve Huston

When facial recognition is implemented everywhere (social media, street cameras, your iPhone, even government databases), hardly anything/anyone is hidden, making us fair game for public intimidation and punishment. More and more there’s the feeling that we’ve stepped out from the pages of Old Country Living and into Brave New World. Who would’ve imagined that these works of fiction would actually become a blueprint of life as we know it?

An article from the Tenth Amendment Center entitled “Minneapolis Bans Government Use of Facial Recognition” brings both good news and a warning. It’s good news that this city is standing up for their constitutional rights and freedoms; it’s disturbing to find out that what we’ve long suspected is true, that our personal information and faces are being taken and used without our permission. The following two paragraphs are from this article; some may be surprised at how long this has been going on.

“A recent report revealed that the federal government has turned state drivers’ license photos into a giant facial recognition database, putting virtually every driver in America in a perpetual electronic police lineup. The revelations generated widespread outrage, but this story isn’t new. The federal government has been developing a massive, nationwide facial recognition system for years.

“The FBI rolled out a nationwide facial-recognition program in the fall of 2014, with the goal of building a giant biometric database with pictures provided by the states and corporate friends.

In 2016, the Center on Privacy and Technology at Georgetown Law released ‘The Perpetual Lineup,’ a massive report on law enforcement use of facial recognition technology in the U.S. You can read the complete report at perpetuallineup.org. The organization conducted a year-long investigation and collected more than 15,000 pages of documents through more than 100 public records requests. The report paints a disturbing picture of intense cooperation between the federal government, and state and local law enforcement to develop a massive facial recognition database.”

One doesn’t need to be a fan of futuristic movies to see how this will end; one only needs to look at contemporary communist China to see the dire, and at times fatal, consequences. It can be used for social credit scores, identifying peaceful protestors, social engineering, and the list goes on.

In an article from CNET we read: “In China, no one is safe from facial recognition, or the public shaming that comes with it. 

“Cameras set up at crosswalks to identify and post photos of jaywalkers are commonplace, and a report from Abacus in May 2019 showed photos of children jaywalking on a digital billboard. The local traffic police said “children should be treated the same as adults,” according to the outlet.

“A Chinese park has also relied on facial recognition to prevent people from taking too much toilet paper, scanning people’s faces before dispensing out the rolls.

“It’s kind of an ‘anything goes’ system there, no matter how minor,” the Constitution Project’s Laperruque said.  ‘Any sort of offense goes for this kind of tech.’

“And while in the US, facial recognition is going through a reckoning over its racial bias and human rights concerns, in China, the surveillance technology’s providers boast its abilities to single out people of different ethnicities.”

The current administration and congress seems bent on dismantling our Constitution, thereby increasing their power while limiting the liberties and rights of those whom the Constitution was made to protect: you and I. Privacy should be considered of premium importance to each of us and with the rise of facial recognition, digital currency (which will not allow any economic freedom or privacy), vaccination cards, and many other things not only on the horizon, but already little by little implemented unbeknownst to us, we should take as many steps as possible to protect our identity and privacy.

Just as a reminder, God already sees everything we do, think, and feel. While man’s facial recognition technology may fail; God’s ability to read the heart, mind, and soul of every man, woman, and child, never does. To this end, “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:” Hebrews 12:14

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