Activists Are Using AI To ‘Identify’ ICE Officers And That’s Definitely Not Good News

(Mis)Uses of Technology

from the here's-the-whirlwind-you-guys-sowed dept

I know it’s never great to blame the victim, but this all could have been avoided if ICE officers hadn’t decided they all needed to act like paramilitary death squad members while raiding Home Deport parking lots. If you’re in the sort of business you feel you can’t do safely with your entire face exposed, you’re in the wrong business.

That this development was inevitable doesn’t make it any more welcome:

An activist has started using artificial intelligence to identify Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents beneath their masks — a use of the technology sparking new political concerns over AI-powered surveillance.

Dominick Skinner, a Netherlands-based immigration activist, estimates he and a group of volunteers have publicly identified at least 20 ICE officials recorded wearing masks during arrests. He told POLITICO his experts are “able to reveal a face using AI, if they have 35 percent or more of the face visible.”

I’m not sure what software Skinner is running on this particular box, but asserting a whole face can be accurately determined from only 35% of a face is a non-starter. I certainly wouldn’t trust cops with this tech add-on to existing facial recognition software. It’s no more trustworthy (perhaps even less!) when it’s being deployed by citizens.

While I’d like to believe regular people would be more careful and conscientious of this tech’s limitations when using it, there’s no reason to believe they won’t be just as bad as cops, who continue to ignore false positives (and false arrests) because the tech makes it easier to arrest people, even if it’s not all that great at actually identifying people.

Of course, all of the administration’s frontmouths claim ICE agents need masks for safety reasons, something that’s being echoed all too often by people who should know better (or at least have staffers that know better).

ICE agents “don’t deserve to be hunted online by activists using AI,” said Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who chairs the Senate Homeland Security subcommittee on border management and the federal workforce.

That’s not a statement anyone can honestly make. There are many things ICE is deserving of, and while being subjected to digital vigilantism is far from ideal, they certainly don’t need more legislated protections — not when they’re backed by billions of new tax dollars and the president’s hatred for all things migrant. But that is what’s happening now, in response to activists’ efforts like these.

On the other hand, some lawmakers are seeking to prevent ICE officers from wearing masks, although it’s unlikely any bill introduced with this end goal will ever go to committee, much less secure the number of votes needed to see it vetoed the minute it hits Trump’s desk.

But it does raise a lot of questions that demand answers, no matter how uncomfortable those answers might be. One of the questions it raises is why do we let cops do this sort of thing if it’s so obviously a problem if a regular person utilizes the same tech for the same reason (identification)? Are legislators really going to keep insisting federal officers are being victimized when this is the sort thing cop shops do far too regularly?

While the technology is recent, the method is not — and in fact a version of it has been used by American police departments on civilians. A 2019 study from the Georgetown Law Center on Privacy and Technology found police departments digitally altering pictures and using artist sketches as the basis for finding suspects through facial recognition.

The biggest question is whether federal officers should be allowed to be masked when engaging in their duties in full view of the public. The answer should, unequivocally, be “No.” Not “No, unless…” or “No, but…” It’s a flat “No” from me. To answer this question any other way simply creates loopholes and excuses for officers, which will inevitably return to the ICE status quo of “everyone wears a mask all the time.”

Sure, if there are officers working in an undercover position, they’re free to conceal their identities. But of course they won’t mask up, because that might put their targets on edge. So, it’s obviously not a “protection” thing when ICE does it. It’s an intimidation thing that goes hand in hand with its abject cowardice thing. They don’t want to be identified because they don’t want to be held accountable for their actions — whether it’s being named in a lawsuit or simply being taunted by name by passersby during raids of Home Depot parking lots.

Is this a good way to fight back against ICE’s (don’t call it a) mask mandate? That’s a flat “No” from me. Using faulty tech to generate questionable IDs compounds existing issues and makes it far more likely to get innocent people hurt and generate legislation that will ensure that only the government gets to use this tech irresponsibly.

While I appreciate the fact that a lot of people feel helpless when faced with this day-to-day onslaught of ICE aggression, you can’t level the playing field by creating a different slope on your side of it. And as much as I want ICE officers to be forced to act like public servants while they’re performing their public duties, I also realize that’s simply not going to happen because that would mean ICE officers won’t be able to violate rights as regularly as they need to in order to keep pace with the administration’s bigoted bloodlust.

For now, the best moves are to express your support for legislators seeking to pass laws forbidding mask use by federal officers and doing what you can to help those affected by mass deportation efforts, whether that’s finding them legal assistance or simply shaming ICE officers out of neighborhoods and parking lots by turning your cameras on them and advancing on their position until they feel forced to retreat. There’s no big victory on the horizon. But every battle counts. Trying to bypass this grind with unproven tech add-ons isn’t going to speed up the process. It’s just going to do more harm than good in a world that already has an excess of harm to deal with.

Filed Under: ai, dhs, facial recognition, gary peters, ice, james lankford, mass deportation, trump administration