While walking down any giving block in New York City, one can bet that they are caught on one of the many security cameras placed throughout the city. With more than 9,000 cameras in the NYPD’s Domain Awareness System, it is nearly impossible to walk down the street without a camera catching one’s face. Some may think that they should have no concern as innocent citizens, but they would be wrong. Police forces in our own country house the faces of almost half of American citizens in their databases without their knowledge. The use of facial recognition software is invasive to the privacy rights of American citizens. Continuing the spread of facial recognition technology in America will bring our country to a police state.

Development of facial recognition technology combined with police body cameras has the potential to change the state of our country. The entire working of public places will be changed. Any police officer will be able to know who someone is, where they’ve been, and if they have any prior offences. While this may be a positive thing in the hunt for criminals, it still puts law-abiding citizens under constant surveillance and suspicion. This “big brother is always watching” life style has no place in the United States of America. This kind of technology is found in communist countries like China and is used by the government to keep tabs on their people. Every day that the United States adds more facial recognition technology to the country, we get closer and closer to this totalitarian system. The facial recognition technology emerging in our country is stripping the rights away from its citizens. As we rapidly approach this invasive lifestyle, we the people must stop and think on if catching a few more criminals is worth giving up our right to privacy.