ICE's Facial Recognition App Misidentified a Woman. Twice

[highplainsdem]

Source: 404 Media

When authorities used Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) facial recognition app on a detained woman in an attempt to learn her identity and immigration status, it returned two different and incorrect names, raising serious questions about the accuracy of the app ICE is using to determine who should be removed from the United States, according to testimony from a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) official obtained by 404 Media.

ICE has told lawmakers the app, called Mobile Fortify, provides a “definitive” determination of someone’s immigration status, and should be trusted over a birth certificate. The incident, which happened last year in Oregon, casts doubt on that claim.

“ICE has treated Mobile Fortify like it’s a 100% accurate record retrieval system of everybody’s immigration status for the entire population of the U.S. when this is obviously not true, and could never be true from a technical perspective,” Cooper Quintin, a security researcher and senior public interest technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, told 404 Media. “It is sickening that ICE is using this flawed app and unacceptable invasion of biometric privacy to supposedly determine whether someone is undocumented and deport them or even worse.”

-snip-

Last week a group of Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation, written by Rep. Thompson, that aims to rein in Mobile Fortify. That legislation would essentially kill the local law enforcement version of the app, restrict use of Mobile Fortify to points of entry into the U.S., and force DHS to delete images of U.S. citizens after 12 hours.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.404media.co/ices-facial-recognition-app-misidentified-a-woman-twice/?ref=daily-stories-newsletter

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Much more at the link.

[groundloop]

1. The bastards just admitted they detained someone without even knowing who she was.

And yet tRump's GQP enablers in Congress allow it.

[Lonestarblue]

2. AI images have repeatedly failed at accurate identification of black, brown, and other ethnicities.

Early on, the programs were trained mostly using white faces. That was supposedly improved, but I doubt is’s anywhere close to perfect. For whatever reason, the AI facial recognition programs used at US airports do not connect my driver’s license photo to my face, even though it’s only a couple of years old and I am white and have changed very little in appearance. I have to carry my passport for all domestic travel, so AI definitely is not infallible.

[Miguelito Loveless]

3. Facial recognition is a crapshoot.

[Martin68]

4. ICE is proving to be the most dysfunctional law enforcement unit in history. Unless murder is their goal...

[Munu]

5. Some people just look like other people ...

... or maybe just "those people" all look alike?

The system can be no better than its software.