A Māori mum misidentified as a trespassed "thief" at a supermarket trialling facial recognition technology says she felt "racially discriminated" against.
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."
"When we make a mistake we own up to it and make it right" I'm sorry doesn't cut in that situation. A company that large doing that should be doing more than saying sorry to make things right.
They can't "put it right" vis a vis that woman, and they have no intention of actually putting it right for others by ending the weird face misrecognition trial.
I think the best case scenario is the Privacy Commisioner watching this trial deciding they aren't allowed to do it long term because of this (and what I'm sure are many other cases of the same this haplening).
Sue sue sue! They keep phrasing this like the problem is that maybe the systems can be inaccurate as the primary problem. But if they were perfectly accurate their existence and deployment in this context is still a travesty. Supermarkets aren't police, they have no right to do this, if I go shopping I'm not volunteering to participate in a lineup. These types of systems are some of the more egregious examples of a larger trend of accepting private companies taking on powers that are only supposed to be tolerated when wielded by the state, I don't want to live life like an inmate, offering you my custom should not be rewarded in this way.
Just wanting to add, that apart from being very angered by the supermarket's in general & their use of this BS technology; I think I kinda want to try chops with fried rice.