Jun 25, 2020 12:30:00

A man who was innocent but accidentally arrested due to face recognition technology

by

Steve Jurvetson

There was a situation where an innocent man was suddenly arrested one day for an entirely unfamiliar crime due to the use of facial recognition technology in the investigation.

Wrongfully Accused by an Algorithm-The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/24/technology/facial-recognition-arrest.html

Facial Recognition Leads To False Arrest Of Black Man In Detroit :NPR
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/24/882683463/the-computer-got-it-wrong-how-facial-recognition-led-to-a-false-arrest-in-michig

In recent years, police have also used facial recognition, which is used to unlock smartphones and PCs, in investigations, and it was also reported that in China the fugitives were found at a concert venue of 60,000 people . However, the accuracy of the face recognition system is not 100%, and the live face authentication system operated by the London Metropolitan Police Department is pointed out that 81% of the people who were recognized as 'suspects' were innocent The problem is that there are many mistakes, especially in blacks.

And in fact, the New York Times has reported an accidental arrest of an innocent black man for facial recognition software.

The person who was wrongly arrested was Robert Julian Borchak Williams. Williams received an office call from the Detroit Police on a Thursday afternoon in January 2020. Mr. Williams, who had no idea at all, first thought that it was a prank call.

But the phone wasn't a prank, and half an hour later Williams was handcuffed in front of his wife and two daughters. At the time of the arrest, police did not explain why Williams was arrested, but only presented a paper with 'felony writ' and 'theft' with Mr. Williams's photograph.

Mr Williams, who was taken to a detention center, was detained all night and was shown three sheets of paper by two detectives in the interrogation room the following afternoon. A photo of a surveillance camera installed in a luxury boutique in Detroit, Michigan was printed on this paper, and a man wearing a red hat was shown. Five boutiques worth a total of $3,800 (about 410,000 yen) have been stolen from the boutique, and Mr. Williams was suspected of this theft.

However, Mr. Williams was clearly not the man's figure taken from the low-quality image. When asked by the detective, 'Is this you?' Williams said, 'No, no. Do you think all black men are similar?'

The technology used by Detroit Police was face recognition technology provided to a company called DataWorks Plus for $5.5 million (about 590 million yen). Originally DataWorks Plus the

mug shot but had to provide management software, then, to extend the product to provide, began selling face recognition technology.

Police are aware that the accuracy of this face recognition technology is not 100%, and the state sent to Detroit police saying, 'This is only to lead the investigation, not the reason for the arrest. Was explained. In addition to face recognition technology, the investigation may have been asked for eyewitness testimony and evidence that the suspect had worn clothes, but in the end, he showed the photograph of Mr. Williams to the guard of the luxury boutique Mr. Williams was arrested based on the reaction at the time.

Williams was detained 30 hours after his arrest and released on bail of $1,000 paid by his wife Melissa. Williams contacted multiple lawyers, but most of them tried to sign a contract on the assumption that Williams was guilty.

However, with the help of lawyer Victoria Burton Harris and the American Free Human Rights Association (ACLU) in Michigan, Williams' charges were dismissed as 'insufficient evidence'. In many criminal cases, the arrested person has no way of knowing 'whether face recognition technology was used in the investigation', but in this case police have allowed the use of face recognition technology. ACLU, Michigan, has filed a complaint against Detroit Police seeking to stop using facial recognition software in investigations.

'The mass surveillance puts civil liberties at the risk of being too big,' said Joy Buolumwini, an information engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The memories of the children who saw the father arrested, the stigma labeled 'criminal' cannot be erased.' Williams was charged with theft, but the same could happen in a murder case.

In consideration of such inaccuracies of face recognition technology, IBM announced that it will withdraw from the face recognition market in June 2020, and Amazon, which sold face recognition technology to police, also said the same technology. Has announced that it will suspend its use by the police for one year .