FACIAL RECOGNITION TECHNOLOGY IN INDIA
Do we know which country has more surveillance being done on the people among the countries in the globe excluding China? The answer, for sure, will shock everyone of our conscience, because of the fact that it is nothing but India that is Bharat (as termed under Indian Constitution). This is because the top four cities which are being surveyed by the government with the help of surveillance cameras, excluding the country of China, are part of the Indian subcontinent and as per the reports cities of Indore and Hyderabad top the cities which use the most number of the surveillance cameras. The second question that we need to look into is why are these many surveillance cameras being employed or used to buy these governments in India and what is the purpose? Is it to reduce the crime rate in India and do we think that the near usage of surveillance cameras would reduce such crime rate in India?
This article will try to answer this question by having a short note on what is special recognition Technology, how far it fits into the principles contained under the Indian Constitution, what is the current stage of implementation of facial recognition technology in India and lastly the challenges that lie for us.
What is Facial Recognition Technology?
Before looking into Facial Recognition Technology and how far it remains as a bad technology while filtered with constitutional principles, Let us have a look at the functioning of facial recognition Technology in general. Facial recognition technology is nothing but an automated process where two images of a person’s face will be used for the purposes of either verification or for identification. The process starts with the uploading of a particular facial algorithm, which shall be recorded as per facial features of a person, as a database in a device and whenever there is a question of identification or verification is concerned, then such an algorithm shall be used. One of the simple examples, as stated by Mr. Nikhil, would be the usage of Face Lock in an Android or iOS device. As mentioned earlier, there are two main purposes that this technology serves, they are, 1. The Identification – where the database shall be identified by comparing with a person’s face and secondly, the verification – where the picture captured through a device shall be compared with the existing facial template. As a result of such usage of technology, the used software shall give a percentage of similarity and their likelihood of whether the image is same as that of the person whose template is stored earlier.
All these technological features might sound very simple and creditworthy when it comes to the investigation aspects but actually they are not the same as we conceive to be. They are dangerous and might result in great injustice if used without any proper guidelines or law in place, in spite of them being used by the government agencies also.
FRT and Indian Constitution:
Let us filter the present functioning of technology with the Supreme Law of the land, which enshrines various principles when it comes to implementation of any subject matter. It is called, checking the constitutionality of the FRT system. Firstly, Article 21 of the Indian Constitution enshrines the unwritten right of privacy within it. But, what does privacy in normal terms mean? The Importance of privacy was discussed heavily in the famous case of K.S. Puttaswamy case, but we move a little earlier and cite the PIL filed by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties, where the issue of Telephone Tapping was challenged constitutionally. In that case, the Supreme Court of India observed that right to privacy with personal liberty would mean an individual to be free from any of the restrictions or the encroachment on his person, either imposed directly or indirectly.
The court ended by stating that when a right like article 21 is curtailed by the state, it has to undergo a very important aspect called due process of law or any procedure established by law. The question before us is whether the use of FRT technology hinders the right to privacy or not?
Take example of Surveillance cameras, which are used to identify or verify. It is reported that the right to privacy gets violated whenever the person is being spied on without the consent and intrudes his personal life. There is duty vested on the state to protect the right to privacy as no right shall exist without any corresponding duty to it. The issue is that, when a camera spies you without you knowing whether you are spied or not, shall infringe the right to privacy and when there is no legitimate reason for doing so on a normal individual. One of the facets of Data Protection Law as per GDPR, (No Data protection law in place in India to question this aspect of consent), is that data of a person shall not be used without their consent. This means, when you walk through a platform in a railway station which has a camera, passing the camera will show your data being accessed in that camera and shall be collected. This is not a normal issue as cited by many reports.
Right to Privacy: Not an Absolute right?
As per Puttaswamy Judgment, it is clear that no right including the right to privacy shall be absolute in nature and there are restrictions that are in place for the same. This means that when a government thinks that there are reasonable grounds to take away your right to privacy, such shall be done by making sure the conditions such as public or legitimate interest is served.
In order to check whether the act of the government shall be legitimate one while exercising this discretion to take away privacy, Justice Sikri laid down a four-fold test to determine the proportionality of the act of government. They are,
There is legitimate goal in restricting the right to privacy of an individual
The act of the government in restricting is to attain the legitimate goal or the purpose only
- There are no other alternatives with effectively efficient with less restrictions
- There is no disproportionate impact on the right holder.
- Only if these four conditions are fulfilled, a person’s right to privacy shall be curtailed as per the opinion and decision of the Supreme Court. The last question is, whether FRT stands with the four fold conditions or whether it is against the same thereby committing the mistake of intruding into the privacy of an individual?
Conclusion:
It is very necessary to answer the last question, not only by me, but by the Indian Government. This is mainly because, as per the four fold test, there are other alternatives which are equally efficient in ensuring the crime being reduced. When there are other ways of reducing the crimes, why the governments in the country (including the state governments) are focusing only on the FRT technology in identifying the accused having known the less efficient of the percentage shown in the FRT technology. In U.S. the same was misused against the Black people and there are more possibilities that this might also be misused by the government of India at this juncture. One of the important solutions to this is to come up with the Data Protection law as soon as possible which should lay down the procedure in which the data from the FRT is to be gathered, when and how it has to be stored and the purpose for which the same is collected and when it should be erased. Only after the law comes into picture, the issue might get resolved thereby ensuring the protection of the right to privacy of an individual.
