TRIBUNE/OPINION – The National Assembly adopted, Tuesday, March 28, the bill on the Olympic Games, despite criticism of its security component: this project provides in particular for the application of video surveillance ” intelligent ” the time of the event to be held in 2024.
What is it exactly?
It is about putting in place “algorithmic processing of images collected by means of video protection systems and cameras installed on aircraft (1) ». If the bill denies wanting to set up facial recognition, it nevertheless recognizes that it wants to proceed, via its camera-protection system, to a “attention signaling, strictly limited to indicating the predetermined event(s) they have been programmed to detect”.
Should we be worried or happy about the implementation of this tool in our security bag?
In fact, for several years now, each exceptional event has been a pretext for the implementation of new control measures which have led to the gradual construction of a surveillance society.
Everyone remembers the draconian impact that September 11, 2001 had on the lives of Westerners. Already at the time, many members of civil society were worried about a drift whose effectiveness was not seen (terrorist threats did not cease with the implementation of global surveillance measures) , and whose durability we did not want either.
This climate lasted for thirty years with, in France, nearly forty laws against terrorism. Then there was the Covid-19 episode with its procession of passes, QR codes, crowd management through fear and denunciation, mandatory confinements…
Even more recently, it was with the Ukrainian conflict that the world of generalized surveillance reached a new milestone. Indeed, the American facial biometric recognition software Clearview, was offered free of charge to the Ukrainian authorities in order to be able to identify the Russian soldiers who died on the front and inform their families for the purpose of psychological warfare.
It is also used to identify potential suspects or enemies at checkpoints, in particular to identify civilian or military targets integrated into the “Mirovorets” filing system. (2). However, Clearview has not only a military vocation, but also a civilian one. According to Washington Postits director assumed that he wanted “expand its data collection capabilities to 100 billion photos, build new products, grow its international sales team, and pay more to lobby government policymakers to ‘develop favorable regulations’ (3) ».
In this context, the Ukrainian conflict gives this company the necessary springboard for mass experimentation that is not very regulated by law. Clearview is only the tip of the iceberg since many American or international competitors are investing considerable sums to recover shares of this promising market (4).
So, should we fear the increasingly significant development of this type of technology in France through events such as the Covid or the Olympic Games?
Some will argue that this market will develop with or without France, and that we have no choice but to get involved too. Nothing is less sure. And we can legitimately fear the abuses that will inevitably occur with these tools once we have opened Pandora’s box: the Chinese model of social control has proven to us that this type of surveillance society is possible and that we may very well not be spared in the near future.
For our part, when we note the abusive use that Emmanuel Macron was able to make of the tools that were at his disposal during the successive crises of his first mandate, we refuse the idea of adding surveillance weapons between his hands.
The identification of criminals in the heart of the masses can continue to be managed by the human factor if we give enough resources to the forces responsible for our security. More generally, we refuse to develop this type of draconian technology. A technology that plunges us into a society of permanent suspicion, where the individual is no longer presumed innocent, but where all the masses are presumed guilty and therefore constantly monitored. A society that borders on the darkest of fictions.
Our freedom will gain what our security will lose. As the philosopher Nicolas Berdiaev wrote: “Perhaps a new century is beginning, a century in which the intellectuals and the educated class will dream of ways to avoid utopias and return to a less perfect and freer non-utopian society (5). »
*Jean-Frédéric Poisson is president of the political party VIA | the way of the people.
Notes :
(1) “Bill relating to the Olympic and Paralympic Games of 2024 and containing various other provisions”, National Assembly, 01/02/2023.
(2) “PEACE MAKER”.
(3) « Facial recognition firm Clearview AI tells investors it’s seeking massive expansion beyond law enforcement », The Washington Postthe 16/02/2022.
(4) “Facial Recognition Market – Growth, Trends, Covid-19 Impact and Forecast (2023-2028)”, Mordor Intelligenceon 10/04/2021.
(5) Epigraph of the original English edition of Brave New World (“Brave New World”) by Aldous Huxley.