Concerns over facial tech usage

Some US police embrace software but civil liberties groups cite privacy issues

Police departments in the United States are increasingly using facial recognition technology to catch criminals, but the software has come under fire by experts who say it has a relatively low success rate, is prone to racial and gender bias, and could lead to wrongful arrests.

There are no official numbers on how many local and state police departments are using facial recognition technology, but at least 50 across the country, including the FBI - which has a database of 36.4 million photos - and the New York City Police Department, the nation's largest, have used or are using facial recognition in some way, according to the Center on Privacy and Technology at Georgetown University law school in Washington.