Police piloted facial recognition software last year

OTTAWA – Ottawa police quietly tested facial recognition software for three months last year, an Ottawa newspaper has learned.

The pilot, which ended in March of 2019, came before a public dialogue on the use of CCTV cameras in spaces like the ByWard Market after a string of fatal shootings in the tourist hub.

Though Ottawa police at the time spoke of the limitations of the surveillance cameras, they did not publicly reveal that the force had been investigating the use of a controversial tool that would go hand-in-hand with such surveillance.

In a statement to the Ottawa Citizen, police said that “the Ottawa Police Service has explored the use of facial recognition technology as a tool to help solve crimes by utilizing photographs of persons of interests in criminal investigations and comparing them with existing databases collected per the Identification of Criminals Act, RSC 185.”

Police likened that to using fingerprints or DNA stored in an existing database to identify people. But Ottawa police said they do not currently use the technology and have no immediate plans to buy or use facial recognition software.

Controversy has swirled around law enforcement’s use of facial recognition technology in recent weeks after a New York Times investigation into a company called Clearview AI.

The Times’ story detailed how the company has created a massive database of open-sourced images scraped from websites across the internet, including Facebook.

Police can then use the database for comparison with things like surveillance images.

According to its website, “Clearview is a new research tool used by law enforcement agencies to identify perpetrators and victims of crimes.”