Posted on May 18, 2022

The New York State Senate's legislation would allow businesses to replace physical ID requirements with facial recognition or fingerprint scans.

This could put a real dent in the fake ID market.

The New York State Senate is moving forward with proposed legislation that would allow bars and restaurants to use facial recognition or fingerprint scanners to verify someone’s age before they buy alcohol, tobacco or electronic cigarettes.

“This is the new frontier of age verification,” said state Sen. James Skoufis, who is sponsoring the biometrics bill. “It does advance the interests of convenience.”

Skoufis envisions that bars and restaurants could scan fingerprints, faces or retinas of customers who want to be spared the trouble of showing an ID when they return to an establishment in the future. The proposed legislation requires all data to be encrypted and prohibits businesses from selling biometric data to third parties.

“No one’s forced into engaging with this technology, but they would have the choice,” Skoufis said. “There’s no big brother involved.”

Skoufis, who chairs the Investigation and Government Operations Committee, said he expects his committee will advance the proposal to the full Senate Monday. There is currently no sponsor in the Assembly though Skoufis said several members have expressed interest.

State lawmakers are scheduled to adjourn for the year on June 2.

Washington state approved a similar proposal in 2018, which allows spectators at professional sporting events to pass security and buy concessions with their fingerprints.

The legislative language states that the State Liquor Authority and the state Department of Health would be responsible for crafting regulations controlling the recording and maintenance of biometric data, which the bill states must be “stored in a centralized, highly secured, encrypted biometric database.”

Expanding the use of biometrics means privacy risks for New Yorkers, according to Albert Fox Cahn, a visiting fellow at Yale Law School and executive director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project. And unlike a credit card number or driver’s license, biometrics cannot ever be changed, he added.

“This is a horrifying invitation for identity theft,” he said. “If one bar or restaurant gets hacked, our identities are compromised for the rest of our lives … more biometric data, potentially expands the power of government agencies to track us because this data is just going to be one court order away from being turned into a policing tool.”

Skoufis responded to the criticism by reiterating that no businesses or customers have to use biometrics if they do not want to. His proposal simply gives them a choice to try out technology that is increasingly becoming part of daily life.

Amazon uses palm readers to verify identities at grocery stores. If the state Legislature approves Skoufis’ bill, infamously rushed New Yorkers might even get to save a little time buying a drink or smoke sooner rather than later.

“If someone has concerns about privacy, there’s a simple solution: don’t use the technology,” Skoufis said in a text. “I prefer to embrace innovation and give people a choice rather than stick my head in the sand and wish I was back in the Middle Ages.”

Original Post: https://nypost.com/2022/04/22/ny-eyes-facial-recognition-to-card-for-alcohol-cigarettes/