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General Intelligence
A Microsoft Employee Literally Wrote Washington’s Facial Recognition Law
Plus, live facial recognition updates and the week’s A.I. research
Welcome to General Intelligence, your weekly dive into the A.I. news and research that matters.
Tuesday should have been a win for privacy advocates. Washington state signed SB 6280 into law, making it the first state in the country to pass a facial recognition bill, which outlines how the government can and cannot use the technology.
But a closer look reveals the bill’s flaws. The law does little to curtail government use of facial recognition, instead setting up basic transparency and accountability mechanisms for when the state does decide to deploy dystopian real-time surveillance.
The bill has little impact on the commercial development or sale of facial recognition technology. The bill doesn’t limit sales to law enforcement, or even hold companies responsible for the outcomes of their algorithms.
The bill was sponsored by State Senator Joe Nguyen, who is currently employed as a program manager by Microsoft
