Evansville officer abused Clearview AI technology

EVANSVILLE — An Evansville Police Department officer resigned earlier this month after an audit found he had been using Clearview AI facial recognition technology for “personal purposes” for several months, Police Chief Phil Smith said during a news conference Tuesday.

Smith told reporters that Officer Michael Eric Dockery used a powerful software package in a way that violated Clearview AI’s terms of service, which some privacy advocates have long pointed to as a potential risk for departments implementing the technology.

Dockery, a nearly five-year veteran of the department, resigned June 5 after Smith placed him on a 21-day unpaid suspension, according to the Police Merit Commission meeting agenda. Smith said he recommended firing Dockery, but Dockery resigned before the merits committee could take such a step.

The revelation that an officer had abused facial recognition software forced the department to implement new safeguards against abuse, Smith said, including implementing mandatory quarterly audits. According to Smith, the incident involving Dockery was “not criminal in nature.”

The Courier & Press first published a report on EPD’s use of Clearview AI tools last year after reviewing police records and company documents. At the time, public officials outside the department said they knew little about how the technology was used.

EPD maintains that the software is a highly effective investigative tool and that officers and detectives use it responsibly.

Clearview AI, a New York technology company, runs one of the most powerful facial recognition suites in the world and has obtained billions of so-called “faceprint” images from social media sites, mugshot repositories and even payment transaction apps.

More:Experts express concern about police use of facial recognition technology in Evansville

Law enforcement agencies that purchase the software can compare images obtained during investigations against the Clearview AI database without the need for a warrant. It was not immediately clear who exactly Dockery was searching and why.

Last year, the Courier & Press newspaper reported that EPD detectives cited Clearview AI results from court records in seeking to arrest a person, a move that went largely unpublicized and sparked criticism from some law and privacy advocates .

Smith: Misuse discovered while preparing to renew Clearview AI software license

Reading from a prepared statement Tuesday, Smith said Dockery’s misuse of Clearview AI software first came to the department’s attention in March.

“While we were in discussions with Clearview AI about renewing our subscription – and reviewing how many licenses needed to be renewed – we conducted an audit of our officers’ use of Clearview AI,” Smith’s statement reads in part. “At this point we observed an anomaly in which the officer was using the software very frequently and his work results did not reflect the number of searches he had performed.”

According to Clearview AI, the facial recognition software package requires law enforcement officers to enter a “case number” before they can perform a search. Smith said Dockery exploited this security process to conduct inappropriate searches.

“A closer look at the digital trail left behind revealed that this officer was using an actual case number associated with an actual incident to conceal searches for people who had nothing to do with the incident,” Smith said. “We further located the images this officer was searching for and found them to be different from images searched during lawful investigations.”

According to Smith, Dockery posted images on Clearview of nine different people between April 2023 and December 2023 that had no connection to the police investigations.

Three of these people reportedly told police they knew Dockery and asked him to review their photos through Clearview AI, which Smith said still constitutes inappropriate “personal use.” The remaining six were unaware of it at the time. During the investigation, EPD contacted all nine and notified them of the searches, Smith added.

According to Smith, an internal investigation into Dockery was completed and found that Dockery did not violate any state or federal law by conducting the unofficial searches.

In response to a reporter’s question Tuesday, Smith said EPD had provided the necessary documents to secure the renewal of the Clearview AI software license. The department did not discuss the Clearview AI incident.

“You are the first people we have talked to,” Smith told reporters. “We felt it was very important to talk to our community first and let them know because when we got the software, we stood in front of everyone and said we were going to use it the right way, and if we weren’t, we were going to take quick action. activities and we wanted to let the community know that this is what we meant.”

Going forward, Smith said EPD will conduct quarterly audits of Clearview’s AI use. Under the Indiana Access to Public Records Act, documents related to such audits will likely be made available for public inspection if a formal request is submitted to the department.