THIS IS REAL TECHNOLOGY — ON SALE, IN USE OR COMING SOON.

Over 4½ years, the FBI searched drivers’ faces more than 36,000 times — without warrants, audits or regular accuracy tests. Maryland and Ohio enrolled all of their drivers’ faces into criminal face-recognition networks without telling them. In Florida, the oldest and perhaps most frequently used system lets police search someone’s face even if that person is not suspected of a crime. In fact, officers are encouraged to use face recognition “whenever practical.”

This rule-free environment is made worse by the fact that face-recognition technology makes mistakes — far more than fingerprints. A 2012 study co-written by an FBI expert found that face recognition makes more mistakes when searching for the faces of African-Americans, women and young people. Depending on how a system is configured, these errors could result in innocent people being investigated.

You may brush off modern privacy invasions. Perhaps you have nothing to hide. But do you resemble someone who does?