The quiet creep of facial recognition systems into New Zealand life
Wednesday, 18 December 2019
Facial recognition systems have quietly crept into casinos, airports and some of New Zealand's biggest retailers.
Inquiries by Stuff reveal the controversial technology is in use everywhere from SkyCity casinos to shops such as The Warehouse.
A security sector insider said he was getting three or four times as many inquiries about the technology compared with two years ago.
Meanwhile, police have enlisted the services of American company Dataworks Plus to design them a new facial recognition system to be rolled out in 2020.
**READ MORE:
* Police facial recognition: Privacy commissioner not consulted on new system**
*** Privacy concerns over police's new 'state of the art' facial recognition system
* Facial recognition could block problem gamblers from pubs and clubs
* Barriers to facial recognition technology are tumbling down
* Sydney cafe offers facial recognition with your takeaway coffee**
CASINOS, RETAILERS USING THE CONTROVERSIAL TECH
Casino giant SkyCity is using the technology in Auckland, Hamilton and Queenstown to identify and block problem gamblers.
Senior management allowed Stuff exclusive access to a room bristling with computer monitors in the depths of the Auckland casino to witness the technology in action.
A staff member enrolled in the system strode off the escalator and onto the gambling floor.
A camera trained on the entry picked up her face, then an algorithm compared the image on the CCTV system to one on file, finding that it was in all likelihood the same person.
Staff heard an alarm and saw a message warning them a banned person had wandered in, at which point a security guard would be deployed.
SkyCity chief operating officer Michael Ahearne said the system was rolled out late in 2019 and is in use at its casinos in Queenstown, Adelaide, Hamilton and Auckland.
He said its use was part of its 'host responsibility'.
The company had images of customers who had voluntarily placed themselves on a banned list because they had a gambling problem.
He would not be drawn on how many people were on the database and said some had been identified as problem gamblers by the casino itself, which had made the call to exclude them.
The system, designed by Kiwi company Torutek, went live in November following trials and Ahearne said it worked well, returning very few false positives.
Facial recognition was only used on the two cameras at each entrance, not the thousands more dotted around the casino, some of which can zoom in so closely they can see the hand of cards gamblers are holding and identify cheats.
'It's been working really well, it's identifying people on that list.
'One of the concerns with a system like this is the number of false positives, which have been quite low. The technology is certainly proving itself.'
A similar system has been used for two years at Christchurch Casino.
Chief executive Brett Anderson said it was used for patrons who were excluded due to their gambling problems.
But it is also used for anyone else the casino has concerns about, including people who had been trespassed for acting up.
'We are looking at a 88 per cent success rate over a recent two-month period.'
Those not nabbed by facial recognition were identified through other means, he said.
The casino is now trialling the system to monitor how long patrons spend on the floor – a key indicator of problem gambling.
His team would approach anyone who spent more than eight hours in the casino, Anderson said.
Supermarket company Foodstuffs, which owns New World, Pak 'n Save and Four Square, revealed in 2018 it was using the systems in some of its stores to identify potential shoplifters.
In response, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said New Zealand should take note of international studies that raised questions over the technology's inaccuracy.
Foodstuffs corporate affairs head Antoinette Laird brushed off recent questions from Stuff about which stores were using facial recognition or whether it had spread to the South Island.
'We are frantic getting everything sorted for Xmas and the holiday season! That's our focus right now,' was her response. She declined to comment further.
A trial of the tech is also under way at an undisclosed branch of The Warehouse to target shoplifters, according to national loss prevention manager Phil Morley.
'As with any security measure, we have strict controls in place to ensure we manage people's privacy appropriately including signage in store to notify customers,' he said.
A Mitre 10 spokeswoman said last year one store in Auckland was using facial recognition but, the company did not respond to recent requests for comment.
Many Kiwis' direct experience with facial recognition is at airports, where Customs eGates use it to match faces to images on passport microchips in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Queenstown.
Wellington Airport will go a step further next year, introducing the technology to verify travellers' identities as part of the international bag drop-off process.
'The automated bag drop-off process will speed up the check-in process for passengers which is a priority for us.'
Countdown and Bunnings said they were not using the technology.
SECURITY SECTOR INSIDER LIFTS THE VEIL
Andre Van Duiven, managing director at Sektor New Zealand, sells security systems, including some with facial recognition technology.
Interest in the systems had shot up recently, he said.
'From my perspective we're probably having three to four times the conversations around facial recognition than we would have two years ago.
'That and licence plate recognition are finding their way into cameras quite dramatically.'
The systems being explored in New Zealand run the gamut from individual identification, as happens in casinos, to those used to measure the proportion of repeat customers.
Some users employed facial recognition to measure demographics of customers, he said.
'So it's not complete facial recognition, it's more about saying I can tell you that about 30 per cent of the people who came into the store were female and aged between 25 and 35.'
Automated license plate recognition, a closely related technology, was similarly used to measure repeat customers or nab shoplifters.
'It's easier to identifying shoplifters by the car they drive than it is by their face because they usually turn up with a stolen car.'
Z Energy uses it to track vehicles involved in petrol drive-offs and also for its Fastlane fuel payment service.
WHY WORRY?
Concerns are mounting about the use of facial recognition in New Zealand.
After Stuff revealed American company Dataworks Plus had been enlisted by NZ police for their multimillion-dollar biometric system upgrade, Privacy Commissioner John Edwards said he should have been consulted given privacy worries around facial recognition.
Facial recognition technology trialled by the London Metropolitan Police misidentified members of the public as potential criminals in 96 per cent of scans in London, The Independent reported in May.
Asked about the reliability of the system, Dataworks Plus executive vice president and general manager Todd Pastorini earlier said: 'We don't make accuracy statements.'
Other concerns about facial recognition technology is that it more frequently misidentified people with dark skin.
University of Auckland associate professor of law Gehan Gunasekara researches information privacy and is the chairman of Privacy Foundation NZ.
He said facial recognition represented a big jump from traditional CCTV systems.
'Once you get facial recognition then you can connect people with places and you've got a permanent log of where people are.
'That is of concern to me. Once you have that infrastructure in place then it's the thin edge of the wedge.'
Without careful supervision, such systems could represent another step in the direction of an 'Orwellian' surveillance state, he said.
'I'm not saying we're going to get to that, but I'm saying every step in that direction needs to be carefully monitored.'