On May 08, 2023, Moneycontrol reported that the Election Commission of India (“ECI”) was planning to pilot the introduction of facial recognition technology (“FRT”) in the polling process by using it in one polling booth in the recent Karnataka state assembly election. We wrote to the Chief Election Commissioner of India (“CEC”) and the Chief Electoral Officer, Karnataka (“CEO, Karnataka”), highlighting our concerns surrounding FRT, and its potentially adverse effects on enfranchisement if implemented on a grand scale within the electoral process. We have also filed two right to information applications (“RTI applications”) to obtain more information about the pilot project.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://internetfreedom.in/we-wrote-to-the-election-commissioner-of-india-on-the-use-of-facial-recognition-technology-for-voter-verification/