CBSA to use facial recognition app for people facing deportation amid privacy concerns

The Canada Border Services Agency plans to implement an app that uses facial recognition technology to keep track of people who have been ordered to be deported from the country.

The mobile reporting app would use biometrics to confirm a person's identity and record their location data when they use the app to check in. Documents obtained through access-to-information indicate that the CBSA has proposed such an app as far back as 2021.

A spokesperson confirmed that an app called ReportIn will be launched this fall.

Experts are flagging numerous concerns, questioning the validity of user consent and potential secrecy around how the technology makes its decisions.

Each year, about 2,000 people who have been ordered to leave the country fail to show up, meaning the CBSA «must spend considerable resources investigating, locating and in some cases detaining these clients,» says a 2021 document.

The agency pitched a smartphone app as an «ideal solution.»

Getting regular updates through the app on a person's «residential address, employment, family status, among other things, will allow the CBSA to have relevant information that can be used to contact and monitor the client for any early indicators of non-compliance,» it said.

«Additionally, given the automation, it is more likely that the client will feel engaged and will recognize the level of visibility the CBSA has on their case.»

Plus, the document noted: «If a client fails to appear for removal, the information gathered through the app will provide good investigative leads for locating the client.»

An algorithmic impact assessment for the project — not yet posted on the federal government's website — said biometric voice technology the CBSA tried using was being phased out due to