Reclaim Your Face! The European Citizens Initiative for a ban on biometric mass surveillance

https://media.ccc.de/v/rc3-2021-cbase-205-reclaim-your-face-the An international alliance of organisations is collecting 1 million signatures to make the European Parliament debate a ban of biometric mass surveillance. We show what we acomplished so far and where the campaign is headed in the next year. We call on the European Commission to strictly regulate the use of biometric technologies in order to avoid undue interference with fundamental rights. In particular, we ask the Commission to prohibit, in law and in practice, indiscriminate or arbitrarily-targeted uses of biometrics which can lead to unlawful mass surveillance. These intrusive systems must not be developed, deployed (even on a trial basis) or used by public or private entities insofar as they can lead to unnecessary or disproportionate interference with people’s fundamental rights. Evidence shows that uses of biometric mass surveillance in Member States and by EU agencies have resulted in violations of EU data prote