We’ll pause while you chuckle at the “politicians are criminals” jokes running through your head. It’s the second time the ACLU has run this type of test. In the first, a test conducted last year, Rekognition was wildly inaccurate, churning out incorrect and racially biased results when attempting to match members of Congress. Phil Ting, a San Francisco Assembly Member, and one of the incorrect matches, used the results to drum up support for a bill that would ban use of the technology in police body cameras. “We wanted to run this as a demonstration about how this software is absolutely not ready for prime time,” Ting said during a press conference. “While we can laugh about it as legislators, it’s no laughing matter for an individual trying to get a job, if you are an individual trying to get a home.”
