Policy Text
1
FACIAL RECOGNITION
POLICY
Effective Date: March 23, 2020
Last Revised: November 2, 202 3
2 Table of Contents
A. Preface
B. Purpose Statement
C. Policy Applicability and Legal Compliance
D. Acquiring and Receiving Facial Recognition Information
E. Use of Facial Recognition Information
F. Requests for Facial Recognition Services
G. Acceptable Search Reasons
H. Automated Facial Recognition Searches
I. Manual Facial Recognition Searches
J. Training
K. Sharing and Disseminating Facial Recognition Information
L. Data Quality Assurance
M. Disclosure Requests
N. Security and Maintenance
O. Information Retention and Purging
P. Accountability and Enforcement
Q. Governance and Oversight
R. Definitions
S. Appendices
3 A. Preface
This policy has been developed by the Riverside Cal-ID Biometric Identification Network (CALID) and is
approved for use and publication by the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department (RCSD). CALID
acknowledges it lacks authority to write policy for individual law enforcement agencies who may utilize
CALID’s facial recognition program or use its system. However, CALID is responsible for the governance,
oversight and operation of its facial recognition system and the program which it provides to the law
enforcement community inside and outside Riverside County. This policy shall be used as the foundation
for those agencies that choose to utilize the CALID facial recognition system. This policy is intended for
CALID personnel and any authorized law enforcement personnel accessing the facial recognition system.
Participating agencies may choose to implement their own policy or impose greater restrictions on their
employees’ use of the CALID facial recognition system as desired. Subsequent agency policy shall not
override this policy and all users of the CALID facial recognition system shall be bound by this policy.
CALID retains exclusive rights to limit or prohibit an individual or agency’s use of the facial recognition
system as warranted.
B. Purpose Statement
Facial recognition (FR) technology involves the ability to examine and compare significant characteristics
of the human face using biometric algorithms contained within a software application. This technology can
be a valuable tool to create investigative leads, reduce an imminent threat to health or safety, and aid in the
identification of persons unable to identify themselves or deceased persons. CALID has established access
and use of a FR application to support the investigative efforts of law enforcement and public safety
agencies within Riverside County. The DataWorks Plus facial recognition software application resides in
the CALID digital mugshot system (DMS ) and is also known as WebMug.
It is the purpose and intent of this policy to provide Riverside County law enforcement personnel with
standards, guidelines, and recommendations for the collection, access, use, dissemination, retention, and
purging of images and related information applicable to the implementation of the FR program. This policy
will ensure that all FR uses are consistent with authorized purposes while not violating the privacy, civil
rights, and civil liberties (P/CRCL) of individuals.
Further, this policy will delineate how FR requests are received, processed, stored, and responded to. The
California Criminal Offender Records Information (CORI) Information Bulletin 13-04-CJIS and the United
States Federal Trade Commission’s Fair Information Practice Principles (FIPP) form the core of the privacy
framework for this policy.
This policy assists Riverside County law enforcement agencies and its personnel in:
• Increasing public safety and improving state and local security.
• Minimizing the threat and risk of injury to specific individuals.
• Minimizing the threat and risk of physical injury or financial liability to law enforcement
and others responsible for public protection, safety, or health.
• Minimizing the potential risks to individual privacy, civil rights, civil liberties, and other
legally protected interests.
• Protecting the integrity of criminal investigatory, criminal intelligence, and justice system
processes and information.
• Minimizing the threat and risk of damage to real or personal property.
4 • Fostering trust in the government by strengthening transparency, oversight, and
accountability.
• Making the most effective use of public resources allocated to public safety entities.
All deployments of the FR application are for official use only and considered law enforcement sensitive.
The provisions of this policy are provided to support authorized uses of FR information.
C. Policy Applicability and Legal Compliance
This policy was established to ensure that all images are lawfully obtained, including FR probe images
obtained or received, accessed, used, disseminated, retained, and purged by CALID. This policy also
applies to:
• Images contained in the known identity face image repository, WebMug.
• The face image searching process.
• Any results from FR searches that may be accessed, searched, used, evaluated, retained,
disseminated, and purged by CALID.
• Lawfully obtained probe images of unknown suspects. Probe images will not be stored to
an unsolved image file (i.e. watch list), for future searches.
All CALID personnel and authorized users working in direct support of their unit or agency, personnel
providing information technology services to CALID, and private vendors, will comply