Lawmakers Press Amazon on Face-Scanning Tech Pitched to ICE

Eight Democratic lawmakers led by Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) and Reps. Jimmy Gomez (D-CA) and Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL) pressed Amazon for answers about the online giant’s efforts to sell controversial real-time facial-recognition technology to law-enforcement agencies. In a Thursday letter to CEO Jeff Bezos, the congressmen cited a Daily Beast and Project on Government Oversight scoop about Amazon’s attempts to pitch its face-scanning system—dubbed Rekognition—to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and said the company “failed to provide sufficient answers” to previous congressional inquiries about the system.