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Supermarket facial recognition trial: Rotorua mother’s ‘discrimination’ ordeal (www.rnz.co.nz)
submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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A Māori mum misidentified as a trespassed "thief" at a Rotorua supermarket trialling facial recognition technology says she felt "racially discriminated" against and embarrassed during the "horrible" birthday incident.

The store is part of a six-month trial of facial recognition technology in 25 of Foodstuffs' North Island supermarkets, which is being monitored by the Privacy Commissioner.

The technology scans customers' faces and compares these images to those on the store's databases of known offenders or suspects.

She said on the evening of 2 April, her 47th birthday, she stopped in with her teenage son to buy chops to go with fried rice from a Chinese takeaway.

She said two male staff approached her in the meat section and one got "literally in [her] face" and loudly told her: "You have been trespassed and you need to go".

She said they insisted she leave, even when she offered photo identification.

Solomon said the "horrible" ordeal went on for about 10 minutes before she and her son left the store without the chops, and she broke down in tears in the carpark.

She said she felt helpless and the incident "ruined what was until then a wonderful birthday".

Consumer New Zealand's chief executive Jon Duffy said the use of this technology was "highly invasive" from a privacy perspective, "like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut".

"Many New Zealanders don't have a choice where they shop which means they may be forced to give up their data, whether they like it or not."

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Sorty if this is a dumb question but does the Privacy Commissioner have power to stop it?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

That's a really good question. I believe the Privacy Act was updated in 2020 to have more teeth but I haven't had to work in that space in a long time so I'm not sure what that changes actually were.

The Privacy Act basically says you can't collect personal info on people without them knowing, and even if they know, without a reason (to sell it to third parties is still a reason).

IANAL so I'm not sure on the ramifications here, but I suspect lawyers aren't too sure either and are waiting for some precident. But collecting people's faces would be personal information. If they don't store it then maybe no harm no foul? But for the people they store (suspected shoplifters - NOT convicted shoplifters), you would have to inform them in some way and get their consent (implied consent via signage?).

The privacy commissioner's office is probably watching closely to see how they implement this within the law to set a standard, but I suspect they don't have a lot of power to stop it if New World follow the Privacy Act (much like Facebook and Google exploit the hell out of people's personal info, but inform them via Ts & Cs).