The European Commission is working on new rules to better regulate facial recognition, the Financial Times revealed on Thursday 22 August. Relying on statements from senior officials, the newspaper explains that the institution wants to limit "the indiscriminate use of facial recognition technology" by companies and public authorities.
When questioned by the media, European Commission spokeswoman Natasha Bertaud refused to comment on leaks in the press. She merely highlighted the documents already published on the subject, namely the Sofia declaration and the report of the High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence (see EUROPE 12283/8).
According to the British newspaper, the objective of such an initiative would be to "foster public trust and acceptance" in facial recognition. The aim is to allow European citizens to "know when [facial recognition] data is used", with "tightly circumscribed" exceptions.
This announcement comes a few weeks after the Financial Times revealed the exploitation of facial recognition in a 300 square metre area around King's Cross Railway Station in London, leading the British regulator to launch an investigation. Earlier, it was in Sweden that the controversy had swelled, with the use of this technology by a school wishing to monitor the daily attendance of students.
The President-elect of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has already announced that, in the first 100 days of her mandate, she will unveil legislation that will offer a coordinated European approach on the human and ethical implications of artificial intelligence (see EUROPE 12303/7). (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)