Local government agencies in San Francisco are prohibited from using facial recognition technology as a surveillance tool in criminal investigations for fear it might be inaccurate, the city’s Board of Supervisors decided in a 8-1 vote on Tuesday, according to The New York Times.
The initiative likely passed as a precautionary measure because neither local police nor the sheriff’s office use facial recognition technology in suspect pursuit currently, even though some tests were performed in the past years to check its efficiency. The ban does not affect federal agencies such as airport security, or businesses and individuals, who will still be able to use facial recognition on devices such as iPhones.