Ban dangerous facial recognition technology that amplifies racist policing
January 25, 2021
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Amnesty International today launches a global campaign to ban the use of facial recognition systems, a form of mass surveillance that amplifies racist policing and threatens the right to protest.
The
Ban the Scan campaign kicks off with New York City and will then expand to focus on the use of facial recognition in other parts of the world in 2021. Facial recognition systems are a form of mass surveillance that violate the right to privacy and threaten the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and expression.
The technology exacerbates systemic racism as it could disproportionately impact people of color, who are already subject to discrimination and violations of their human rights by law enforcement officials. Black people are also most at risk of being misidentified by facial recognition systems.
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The City of Newburgh held a public hearing Monday night on its draft report on police reform. It’s part of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s executive order requiring local police agencies to modernize their strategies and programs based on community input. One of the related laws the city adopted over the summer faced a lot of backlash, and the city manager announced at the start of the hearing that the law was now tabled.
Newburgh City Manager Joe Donat made the announcement before calling the names of the 23 people who signed up for the virtual public hearing.
“Now I understand that there’s some concerns out there regarding the information that is being requested of the community when they interact with the police,” Donat says. “So what we have done is we have pressed the pause button here.”
By: Jennifer Korn
After winning a three-year legal battle centered on the East Ramapo school district’s favoritism of private schools, the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) is facing another predicament.
The district board disagrees that they owe NAACP $4.3 million in legal fees and has threatened to dismiss teachers and other school staff if the fees are not cut to $1.
“It’s hostage-taking,” said Dr. Oscar Cohen, Spring Valley NAACP Education Committee Chair.
Spring Valley NAACP President Willie Trotman described the proposed layoffs as an act of retaliation and asserted that his organization is solely concerned with providing children an opportunity to get an education. “Nobody should be able to take that right from them,” said Trotman.