“The European Commission came under fire on Wednesday (19 February) for ruling out a moratorium on facial recognition, as the bloc’s new strategy for data and artificial intelligence (AI) governance was unveiled.
“It is of utmost importance and urgency that the EU prevents the deployment of mass surveillance and identification technologies without fully understanding their impacts on people and their rights,” warned Diego Naranjo, head of policy at European Digital Rights.
But the commission vice president Margarethe Vestager said only on Wednesday that the EU’s executive body will launch “a broad European debate to determine the specific circumstances, if any, which might justify the use” of facial recognition.“
EU backtracks on plans to ban facial recognition (EUobserver, link)
See: White Paper On Artificial Intelligence – A European approach to excellence and trust (pdf) and: A Europe Fit for the Digital Age: Empowering people with a new generation of technologies (EC, link)