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New York Issues First-in-Nation Moratorium on Facial Recognition in Schools

18 points by 1cvmask 6y ago

bko 6y ago
This may be a very unpopular opinion but I don't think its unreasonable to have a very tight control over who enters/leaves a school. It all depends on the implementation but ultimately I think it should be a parents choice. Personally I would not be opposed to facial recognition in school and I don't think there is any expectation of privacy in schools. Risks could include someone unauthorized coming to take a child out of school (e.g. ex-husband/wife) But I'm open to change my mind and hear the arguments against it.
- pavel_lishin 6y ago
  I think you're imagining the best possible implementation, but we have to guard agains the worst. False negatives and positives, a false sense of security, problems with accidentally being put on the wrong list, etc. I also don't understand how it could be a parent's choice if a school implements this against a parent's wishes - their choice would boil down to "enroll their child in school, or withdraw them." Controlling who enters and exits a school is fine, I just don't believe that the software would offer that sort of control.
  - bobthepanda 6y ago
    Not to mention, most school districts in NYS are geographically based. So your option isn’t to go to another free public school district, you’re basically picking homeschooling or expensive private schooling, and not every household is in a position to do that. Facial recognition should not be “a price to pay” to go to school.
- topkai22 6y ago
  I’d be quite surprised if the schools in question didn’t already have tight control of the ingress/egress points of the school, so the there really is a question of if this technology has substantial benefit at the margin. I find that unlikely, given the stated purpose is “ intended to more easily identify sex offenders, unauthorized school staff or other adults that might be dangerous” since literally every school I’ve been to since 1996 requires ID checks of every adult entering the building, and volunteers get fingerprinted and run through criminal databases. So now you have a system that can’t clearly accomplish it’s stated purpose, but does have serious potential side effects. Now I also agree in strong local control of schools and think the state should have done the study before enacting the moratorium, but as a parent I wouldn't support it at my school / district as presented in the article.
- curryst 6y ago
  > Personally I would not be opposed to facial recognition in school and I don't think there is any expectation of privacy in schools. I disagree for a number of reasons. First of all, we are dealing with children that are largely under 18, and are not able to provide consent to be monitored. As such, I think we should tread very carefully, with a tendency towards violating their privacy as little as is possible. I'm not convinced that the problems facial recognition will solve are prevalent enough to warrant foisting an extremely invasive monitoring system upon people who cannot reasonably consent to that monitoring system. Additionally, school is legally mandated. Even if the children were of age to consent, their consent is effectively void because of coercion. They do not have the option to say "no" unless they can afford to pay for a private school. I don't think "privacy for the rich, state surveillance for the poor" is a good paradigm. I understand where you're coming from, keeping kids safe is important. But I think it's important to remember that even though they're kids, they should have rights, and it's up to the rest of us to protect them.

18 points by 1cvmask 6y ago

bko 6y ago

This may be a very unpopular opinion but I don't think its unreasonable to have a very tight control over who enters/leaves a school. It all depends on the implementation but ultimately I think it should be a parents choice. Personally I would not be opposed to facial recognition in school and I don't think there is any expectation of privacy in schools. Risks could include someone unauthorized coming to take a child out of school (e.g. ex-husband/wife) But I'm open to change my mind and hear the arguments against it.

pavel_lishin 6y ago
I think you're imagining the best possible implementation, but we have to guard agains the worst. False negatives and positives, a false sense of security, problems with accidentally being put on the wrong list, etc. I also don't understand how it could be a parent's choice if a school implements this against a parent's wishes - their choice would boil down to "enroll their child in school, or withdraw them." Controlling who enters and exits a school is fine, I just don't believe that the software would offer that sort of control.
- bobthepanda 6y ago
  Not to mention, most school districts in NYS are geographically based. So your option isn’t to go to another free public school district, you’re basically picking homeschooling or expensive private schooling, and not every household is in a position to do that. Facial recognition should not be “a price to pay” to go to school.
topkai22 6y ago
I’d be quite surprised if the schools in question didn’t already have tight control of the ingress/egress points of the school, so the there really is a question of if this technology has substantial benefit at the margin. I find that unlikely, given the stated purpose is “ intended to more easily identify sex offenders, unauthorized school staff or other adults that might be dangerous” since literally every school I’ve been to since 1996 requires ID checks of every adult entering the building, and volunteers get fingerprinted and run through criminal databases. So now you have a system that can’t clearly accomplish it’s stated purpose, but does have serious potential side effects. Now I also agree in strong local control of schools and think the state should have done the study before enacting the moratorium, but as a parent I wouldn't support it at my school / district as presented in the article.
curryst 6y ago
> Personally I would not be opposed to facial recognition in school and I don't think there is any expectation of privacy in schools. I disagree for a number of reasons. First of all, we are dealing with children that are largely under 18, and are not able to provide consent to be monitored. As such, I think we should tread very carefully, with a tendency towards violating their privacy as little as is possible. I'm not convinced that the problems facial recognition will solve are prevalent enough to warrant foisting an extremely invasive monitoring system upon people who cannot reasonably consent to that monitoring system. Additionally, school is legally mandated. Even if the children were of age to consent, their consent is effectively void because of coercion. They do not have the option to say "no" unless they can afford to pay for a private school. I don't think "privacy for the rich, state surveillance for the poor" is a good paradigm. I understand where you're coming from, keeping kids safe is important. But I think it's important to remember that even though they're kids, they should have rights, and it's up to the rest of us to protect them.