watch commencement speeches all week on c-span. at eight :00 eastern, speakers include former georgia democratic house minority leader stacey abrams at american university school of public affairs. north carolina republican representative mark walker at piedmont international university. and, we will look back to june 1963 with president john f. kennedy's remarks at american university. watch commencement speeches tonight at 8 p.m. eastern on c-span. watch online anytime at c-span.org and listen on the free c-span radio app. host: washington post technology reporter drew joins us for a spatialon about that recognition technology you just saw, about the legal and ethical it.te surrounding before that, first, explain how this technology is being incorporated into law

and the security sectors and how widespread it is right now. guest: deputies and police thess the country -- traditional way, when they would get camera or video footage of a robbery or some witness catching somebody on camera, they would pass it around to other deputies and say hey, anybody recognize this person? it was a very poor investigative technique as you can imagine. with facial recognition, they are able to upload the photo or video almost like a google spit out ait will couple different possibilities of identification and they will be pulling from big databases. it is a way for investigators to quickly identify somebody from photos that just came from somewhere and hopefully speed up the investigation. host: take us to washington county, oregon. you were at the sheriff's office using the facial recognition

technology. take us through a typical day in a case that uses this technology. guest: sure. this is outside portland, oregon. they were the first to use the service and one of a couple dozen across the country. for them, a deputy on the scene will get a call about a robbery. navy surveillance footage of somebody who stole a bottle of wine. the deputies can get that video, upload that from their in-car computer and in a couple of seconds, the system will spit out five potential matches based off of the former mugshots that they have had, booking photos from jail. it pulls 300,000 mugshots and out pops either somebody that the system thinks looks exactly like that search, or just sorry, we can't find anybody. the system,ou say this isn't the system that the sheriff office build and is administering itself. explain what they are using.

guest: amazon created an ai technology that they call recognition with a k. that does all the hard work for this search. the sheriff's office uses its own internal. there is a lot of different surveillance contractors that will turn to facial recognition searches which all operate in the same way and make it very quick and very easy for these deputies to identify somebody from afar without their knowledge or consent. host: we should note that jeff bezos, something that you always put in your stories to note, part owner of the washington post. how many police departments are doing what the office in washington county oregon is doing? guest: there have been a couple of georgetown studies that suggested maybe a couple dozen to 50 around the country.

this ranges from the big police departments including new york, to smaller, regional facilities including washington county and oregon. the crimes are different, but the youth cases are very similar. we are seeing this take up very quickly. ton oft really have a transparency into how many organizations are using this technology. there is no real federal regulation about facial recognition at all. there is no stipulation that the sheriff's office has to say we are using it or we are not. get: and we are going to into that discussion on several levels but we invite you to call in if you have questions about facial recognition technology and how it is being used. the lines are split up regionally. eastern or central time zones, (202) 748-8000. mountain or pacific time zones, (202) 748-8001. you can go ahead and start calling in. cardwell, how many laws

deal with this issue and technology? guest: zero. that is a lot of thing that a lot of civil rights advocates have been questioning, why don't we have a strong federal regulation about technology that dozens of law enforcement agencies are using to investigate and identify and arrest people? this is a technology that is being brought into courtroom and jail by being part of how people get arrested, yet there is no federal guidelines for which deputies can search, how they can search, the quality of the images they can use. all of these go into a heightened risk of potential misidentification, abuse of the system. these worries are concerns from privacy and civil rights advocates. is this a country we want to live in, where surveillance is heightened, where police can identify anybody from afar? all of these questions of big

brother, the worries over the system. is ann china, this important part of social control and government surveillance. intof those are strewing what lawmakers are talking about. host: do amazon or some of these other companies creating their own technology, do they want a federal regulatory scheme? or are they fine with continuing as things are now? guest: all of the companies have different platforms, but a lot them, including amazon, have said we need a national legislative framework. we need some rules around this because right now we are flying blind. in what the rules will look like and how soon they want them. a lot of advocates are saying they need to ban this technology outright or have a better understanding of what the best practices are. companies like amazon say this is something that is eating effective for police right now. use toot an appropriate

pull it back. we need to work on legislative framework as we continue. host: you talk about the quality of searches and which images were the best in the system. one discussion at a recent house oversight and government reform committee hearing, this is a tez asking one of the experts who came to testify about this very issue. >> we saw that these algorithms are effective to different degrees. are they most effective on women? no. are they most effective on people of color? >> absolutely not. so, what demographic is it mostly effective on? >> white men. >> and who are the primary engineers and designers of these algorithms? >> definitely white men. technology that

was created and designed by one demographic that is only mostly effective on that one demographic and they are trying to sell it and impose it on the entirety of the country? pell-mellhave the data sites being used as something that is universal when that is not actually the case when it comes to representing the old spectrum of you manage. -- the full spectrum of humanity. host: were you at that hearing? guest: yes, she is an m.i.t. researcher. she has done research about the accuracy of facial recognition systems when it comes to color and gender. not all faces are treated the same by these systems and a large part of that is because of the data that was fed into the system to train them, a lot of white men. so the system learns to refine those faces better than others.

so there is a tacit suggestion that these systems are not perfect and any imperfection can lead to a false arrest. that is a dangerous scenario and a precedent we are going into. host: a good time to call in is right now. it atas been covering washington post.com and on tw itter. we will chat with vicki from twin falls, idaho. caller: good morning. this technology, and more importantly, the systems behind it, are all part of what the u.s. government has built, which is a police state. a secret police state. this surveillance technology, it photos thatabase of

anybody takes because the government partners with the private sector. people that are called data aggregators that collect database abouta them. while they are presenting this technology to be just used by the police, it can be used by anybody. it is a very dangerous thing. in fact, the entire police state infrastructure that has been built to surveillance and track and keep information on american citizens is hugely important. that the entire world would have just loved to have. host: got your point. those concerns? guest: those are concerned that

a lot of people are sharing. before we had anger prince, we had that level of very low technology that allowed deputies to identify people under some very specific scenarios. now, this technology can identify anybody from afar, in a crowd. you don't need the person of interest to know they are being surveilled. i think there are important questions. these worries over surveillance state are key to this broad resistance of a show recognition. host: when you talk about resistance, explain what is happening in san francisco. guest: san francisco became the first city to ban local city and police use of facial recognition technology. change for sanig francisco, very symbolic in the fact that san francisco is the heart of the tech community in america. it felt like here are the people building the system, and they are also the first to say we don't want it surveilling us.

and yet, there are other cities and communities in california and massachusetts that are suggesting that other bans could be appropriate. seeing thesee technologies expand throughout the country quicker than the laws responding. guest: -- host: florida, good morning. my firstes, this is time being on c-span, i watch you all the time. hitler used to use the ibm with -- that's why the tattoos on the datawere from the processing. another thing hitler used to do, he used to take pieces of cloth from people and put it in glass jars and seal it with their names so the dogs could go after a person.

it hasn't changed, it has just gotten more technology. host: bruce, would you be in favor of fort walton beach the usethis technology, of this technology as we just heard about? a heartbeat in because what is going to happen is, like the lady before me, it is going to be used not for good, but for bad. always for bad, never good for you. take us to some of the reaction to sheriff's deputies you talked to and other law enforcement officials and how they are using this and how they see it used. guest: it is split. with every technology, there are good and bad uses. you see the deputies and people who are supportive of that community saying this is a way that our deputies cannot just save time, cannot just have more accurate investigations, liquor

arrest of the bad guys, but essentially make them safer by knowing who they are looking at. there is that side of it. on the flip side, there is just as similar amount of passion of people saying this is a step too far. noted, thisors have is an extremely powerful technology that the government can use or misuse area that governments are currently using across the world to surveilled populations. in the middle is the general public that can see the benefits, but also is worried about the harm. i think that is what it may be an appropriate time that lawmakers are considering what is right. host: can you talk about how it is being incorporated for personal security uses? guest: a lot of people know facial recognition from iphone. use isy of face-to-face

being used in airports right you it is being something could install someday in a doorbell camera to have gated access. it is also being used in schools. a number of schools are using this at the doorways to flag when somebody comes in who may not be permitted on the school, an expelled student or troublesome parent. technology is so cheap and easy to deploy that a lot of organizations are ruling it out and only now confronting the ethical and moral questions that go along with it. host: how many schools, and where? guest: we don't really have a good number, but it is growing very quickly. last i looked, there was a dozen, maybe two dozen. it is rolling out quite quickly. there's a couple of private

schools around the northeast including in new york state. we are seeing it also at community centers and playgrounds. something that anyone with a normal surveillance camera can pretty easily update the software, so a lot of administrators are saying we want that security, too. host: 10 or 15 minutes left, our discussion about a show recognition technology. in the eastern or central time zones. (202) 748-8001 if you are in the mountain or pacific time zone. new jersey is next, ron. caller: good morning. they are coming up with new photo id for boarding airports starting march 1. you have to renew your driver's license starting this saturday and get a new photo id with a star on it. does this have anything to do with the photo identification? guest: so, i don't know about

the four id with a star on it, but i know that this is an important part of what dhs is saying about how they want security at the airports. a lot of airports, maybe a dozen terminals across the country, are adding facial recognition kiosks at the gate. in some scenarios, you don't even need a ticket, you just look into the camera and did your face scanned -- get your face scanned. it is only in a couple terminals right now but within the next foryears, dhs once this more than 90% of all domestic or international air travelers flying out of the country. they see this as an important part of security. u.s.lso, citizens of the can opt out of that. i think dhs realizes that they want to be using this technology as well.

they feel like it's an important way to know who is and who isn't leaving the country including when looking at these overstaying issues. this isn't going away. without suggestions of how this should be used by lawmakers as being deployed now first, they are asking questions later. host: joaquin is in colorado, good morning. caller: i was calling since you mentioned there is no regulation amazon does what about any self-regulation, or thinking about how to limit the technology as to who has access and who can use it. also, second question, any comment about the use of this technology in china and are there any lessons we can learn from that? guest: great questions. the first one, you hit it on the head, self-regulation. amazon has set up their own rules and their clients have

their own sets of rules as well about who can use it, where they can use it. the office says they don't want to use it for mass surveillance. they can't use it for profiling, they can't just look for all men or all women or all racial or religious groups. but it is all self-regulation and that is limiting because they are the ones enforcing the rules. amazon has their own guidelines online, but what they do when that ise abuses of the question for later. on the second part, we do see this in china. china is the premier surveillance state across the world using facial recognition. you see it in some limited ways for naming and shaming jaywalkers in different parts of china. they will slap your face up on a tv billboard to say that we see

you doing this. but it is also being used in a much more concerning way with the population. it is effectively being used in what u.s. intelligence is saying are reeducation camps. itt is concerning because shows that a government with enough interest and enough money in that technology can keep closer tabs on their people than ever. i think when a government has there's allf power, sorts of questions of the rights we have in the u.s. of the first amendment right to peaceably assemble and a fourth amendment rights, protections from unreasonable searches. yes, those are quickly becoming global questions. host: thomas is in west springfield, massachusetts. caller: good morning. host: go ahead with your comment

or question. calling about the facial recognition. theve no problem with it, only people that should be using are the intelligence. host: to that point? guest: that is a defense of a folks, the only people with something to fear are people with something to hide. i think that would be an accurate response if the technology was 100% accurate but it is not. the potential for misidentification for somebody who has been falsely identified as being the criminal caught on tape, i think those are worries

for everybody, guilty or innocent. some publicing that figures have told me who are looking at this on the ground, saying it is all easy to think about when you are just thinking of criminals, but it affects all of us. host: i wonder your thoughts about wild and wonderful's comment on twitter: "there are no doubts that this technology can and will be misused but people don't even do the easy privacy. provide they go on facebook and provide a daily report of everything they do and everywhere they go." guest: we have lots of data about ourselves over the last several years. but i also think that it is impossible to totally guard against this idea of surveillance because these are the things we present to the world every day. unless you wear a mask day and night, this is a system that can affect your.

host: crescent springs, kentucky, good morning. yes, i'm concerned about the tsa and the new generation identification being used on our drivers license and that has been mandated by the state of kentucky last year. if you go to get a drivers license which gives you a gold that new generation identification which is facial recognition, that ship will be used for a multitude of other issues. also, i believe that it is not reliable. smell test,pass the it stinks. it takes away our constitutional rights and our common law. ,t violates our due process freedom to travel and states rights. we are sovereign states. the federal government is controlling our life over and over and over and it has got to stop.

this basically came from the real id from the 2005 real id solution and they are already doing this throughout the entire world. amazon, we have become their product and their commodity. for this to be based on white men only, this is a true violation of our rights as people to live free. and if you give up some of your security for freedom, you will have neither. thank you. host: on the real id, the nationwide law that everyone boarding a federally regulated commercial aircraft will need to have real id or some other acceptable form of id, october 1, 2020 is the deadline. guest: yes, these are what the two callers have brought up. the federal pivotal government believes the technology is to safeguarding the border and understanding where its citizens come and go.

i think all of those concerns are real ones. you are hearing them from a lot of people. one other frustration is that these kiosks are appearing in airports without a lot of people realizing they were being pulled in in the first place. i think the silty with which -- in the subtlety with which the technology exploded has caught some people off guard. there is real power in a technology like this that can potentially be used against people. i think people are coming to terms with that this is something they need to know more about. south carolina, chris, good morning. caller: good morning. yes, my question is with walmart and they have this when you checkout at the cash register, it taking a picture of you on camera, and you turn around, it is recording your picture and

the credit card used and going into the system. that is linked to facebook and other stuff like that, where is that information going? who is allowed to accept that information? why are they doing all that? are they selling it? what is happening to it? if you aree that african-american or whatever stuff and use that to illegally follow you? host: thanks for the question. guest: i'm not specifically sure exactly what walmart is doing, but if this is something you are seeing more in walmart and a lot of stores. i was seeing that they are getting those surveillance photos and videos.

those high-definition images that walmart or some other stores are capturing, they send them right over to the police department. we are seeing lots of cameras deployed. not all of them had facial recognition but a lot of experts know that retail is a big market for this. not just for safeguarding and protecting against shoplifting, knowing a little bit more about the people who shop and where they are going and what kind of demographics they are. i think we are seeing this happen a lot more in big box stores as well where they feel like there is a huge amount of traffic coming in to the store. host: david is in illinois, good morning. caller: i was going to make the

exact same walmart point. what are the numbers in terms of the accuracy of this? can you put on glasses or a fake mustache and will list technology except this? guest: the algorithms are highly variable in how accurate they are. sometimes glasses and a mustache will not be able to fool the of factors a lot play into it. a lot of surveillance cameras are in the ceiling and they look down at people. those can contribute to inaccuracies. the quality of the image ends up being a huge factor. one of his facial recognition services, just based on where the camera was or how the light was that day. all of those factors play into and believingies

in the confidence of those search results when really it is just as inaccurate as anything else. host: st. petersburg, florida, good morning. caller: good morning, how are you? my question is, i've got an hp laptop that i purchased last year and it goes completely by facial recognition. it had me take a bunch of poses in different scenarios with my glasses, without my glasses. how is hp using this to follow up on mr. north carolina? seriously, are they selling it? guest: i don't know specifically about hp, i know a lot of companies are using this to unlock a phone or a computer or something else, they say they

don't sell the data, sometimes they don't even transmit the data. maybe it is just saved on the laptop, just an image for the laptop. but you are right, these photos are saved somewhere. they are indexed into a database somewhere along the line. whether they are the servers owned by large companies. as we've seen in a number of cases, this data can travel very quickly without our knowledge. there are worries from people saying, look at these huge databases being created every day around the country. who can look at those photos, what can be done with them? all of those are good questions ont lawmakers have waited and that will be in the question as we consider the technology rollout. host: you can find drew