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Auditor Says FBI Database of Faces Lacks Privacy Safeguards

Posted on June 5, 2019June 24, 2025 by Dissent

Brandi Buchman reports:

Back for Day 2 of an oversight hearing on the government’s use of facial-recognition software, lawmakers were left momentarily and uncharacteristically speechless Tuesday as an auditor at Homeland Security detailed the FBI’s database of 640 million faces, a number that is twice the population of the United States.

Gretta Goodwin, director of Homeland Security’s Government Accountability Office, explained that just 36 million of the photos in the FBI’s Next Generation Identification System depict people who have been arrested or part of a criminal probe.

Another 21 million photos in the same system involve people from civil matters, but Goodwin said the bulk of the 640 million faces come from the myriad state and federal agencies, like a DMV or the State Department, which the FBI can reach out to, as it deems appropriate.

Read more on Courthouse News.

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