Databases of facial images, addresses and photos contain sensitive information about individuals, which can be vulnerable to exploitation and data breaches. Cybercriminals and malicious actors could hack this database and gain access to facial recognition data for identity theft, stalking, deepfakes, robbery, harassment, impersonation and online scamming. Since faces cannot be encrypted to keep them secure like other types of data, they remain unprotected and AI makes it convenient to capture facial images to link them to individuals. This democratization of personal data collection undermines individual privacy and freedom in society.

Facial recognition is prone to inherent judgemental bias and prejudice against marginalized groups, especially women and people of colour, due to biased training data and programming. As a result, people can be misidentified, convicted and wrongly accused of committing crimes — which can significantly alter their lives, create long-term psychological trauma and ruin their self-worth and reputation. Authoritative regimes can also abuse this technology to detect and target ethnic minorities. For example, China’s Huawei developed facial recognition software to identify and report Uighurs to government officials. This misuse of AI demonstrates how misidentification and inherent biases in technology systems can harm society’s most vulnerable groups and enable authoritative regimes to invade privacy and commit genocide and acts of violence.

Facial recognition and AI systems are an evident infringement of personal privacy, expression and freedom. The thought of being monitored and surveilled can cause negative psychological effects, emotional stress and erode trust between people and the social fabric. People will feel discouraged and unmotivated from political activism due to their lack of privacy. For example, AI is used for mass surveillance and population control in demonstrations and protests, especially in totalitarian countries. During 2020, the San Francisco Police Department accessed over 400 cameras to spy on protestors, exemplifying that technologies can often be manipulated to restrict people’s freedom of speech and expression and right to anonymity.