Bright sword towards abuse of face recognition technology
From the construction of smart cities to the login and unlocking of mobile clients, face recognition has gradually penetrated into all aspects of life in recent years. While bringing convenience to social life, the problem of personal information protection has become increasingly prominent.
On July 28th, the Supreme People’s Court issued the Provisions on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Laws in the Trial of Civil Cases Related to the Use of Face Recognition Technology in the Handling of Personal Information (hereinafter referred to as the “Regulations”). Bright sword.
Say no to abuse of face recognition technology in business premises
According to the "Face Recognition Application Public Survey Report" released by the App Special Governance Working Group in 2020, among more than 20,000 respondents, 94.07% of the respondents have used facial recognition technology, and 64.39% of the respondents It is believed that facial recognition technology has a tendency to be abused, and 30.86% of the respondents have suffered losses or privacy violations due to the leakage and abuse of facial information.
Yang Wanming, a member of the party group and vice president of the Supreme People's Court, pointed out that in reality, some operators abuse face recognition technology to infringe on the legitimate rights and interests of natural persons.
For example, some well-known stores use "non-inductive" facial recognition technology to collect consumer facial information without consent.
Some sellers publicly sell facial recognition videos, buying and selling facial information on social platforms and websites.
Problems such as "loaning" and infringement of privacy and reputation rights often occur due to the leakage of identity information such as face information.
Regarding the abuse of face recognition technology in business premises for face recognition, face analysis, etc., Article 2 of the "Regulations" clarifies that violations of business premises and public places such as hotels, shopping malls, banks, stations, airports, stadiums, entertainment venues, etc. According to laws and administrative regulations, the use of face recognition technology for face verification, identification, or analysis is an act that infringes upon the personality rights and interests of natural persons.
For some businesses that use unreasonable methods such as one-time general authorization, bundled with other authorizations, "no service provided if you disagree," and other unreasonable methods to process the facial information of natural persons, Articles 2 and 4 of the "Regulations" clearly deal with the facial information of natural persons , The individual consent of a natural person or his guardian must be obtained; violation of individual consent, or forcing or disguisedly forcing a natural person to consent to the processing of their facial information constitutes an act that infringes on the personality rights and interests of a natural person.
In order to balance personal interests and public interests, Article 5 of the "Regulations" clarifies the exemption of the use of face recognition, including handling necessary to respond to public health emergencies or to protect the life, health and property safety of natural persons in emergency situations Facial information; in order to maintain public safety, use face recognition technology in public places in accordance with relevant national regulations; conduct news reports for public interest and process facial information within a reasonable range, etc.
Face information of minors will be specially protected
As the application scenarios of face recognition become more and more extensive, more and more scenes are collected for facial information of minors.
“Because of the relatively weak awareness of personal information protection of minors and their curiosity about new things, the probability of their facial information being collected is relatively high,” said Guo Feng, deputy director of the Research Office of the Supreme People's Court.
Guo Feng introduced that the "Regulations" strengthen the protection of minors' facial information from the judicial trial level.
In accordance with the principle of informed consent, Article 2 Item 3 stipulates that information processors must obtain the individual consent of their guardians when processing the facial information of minors.
From the perspective of liability determination, the "Regulations" clearly set "whether the victim is a minor" as a special consideration for the determination of responsibility. For those who illegally handle the facial information of minors, the responsibility shall be taken seriously in accordance with the law to ensure that the minors Face information is specially protected in accordance with the law.
The community's use of "swiping face" instead of "swiping card" should obtain the user's consent
With the continuous enrichment of the application scenarios of face recognition technology, some communities have introduced face recognition systems, using "swiping face" instead of "swiping card".
Some people believe that using face recognition as a method of household identity verification can more accurately identify people entering and leaving the community, making community management safer and more efficient.
There are also concerns that once the facial information is leaked, it may cause damage to personal privacy.
"Facial information is sensitive personal information. The collection and use of facial information by residential properties must obtain the consent of the owner or the user of the property in accordance with the law." Guo Feng pointed out that in practice, some residential properties compulsorily require residents to enter facial information. And use face recognition as the only verification method to enter and exit the community, this behavior violates the principle of "informed consent".
According to Article 10, paragraph 1 of the "Regulations", the community property shall obtain the consent of the owner or the user of the property when using the face recognition access control system to enter facial information, and the community property shall provide an alternative verification method for those who do not agree. , Shall not infringe upon the personality rights and other legal rights of the owner or the user of the property.
App forces the claim to invalidate the facial information
For a period of time, some apps have forcibly obtained non-essential personal information through package authorizations and bundled with other authorizations, which has become a difficulty for many consumers in protecting their rights.
In order to regulate such behaviors from a judicial perspective, Chen Longye, Director of the Civil Division of the Research Office of the Supreme People's Court, introduced that the "Regulations" clarified the following treatments in accordance with Article 1035 of the Civil Code, absorbing the spirit of personal information protection legislation and borrowing from foreign practices The rules of face information: One is to agree to the rules individually.
When an information processor obtains personal consent, it must obtain individual consent for face information processing activities, and cannot obtain personal consent through a blanket notification of consent, etc.
The second is to force consent to invalidity rules.
For information processors that use methods such as "bundling with other authorizations" and "no services provided without clicking on consent" to force or in disguise to force natural persons to consent to the processing of their facial information, if the information processors believe that they have obtained the corresponding consent, the people The court did not support it.
(Reporter Jin Hao)