A biennial privacy survey of 1,200 New Zealanders was released on 13 May, with around half of respondents concerned or very concerned about the use of facial recognition technology in retail stores to identify individuals, writes Nicholas Dynon.
The number and size of privacy breaches, combined with the increasing reach of technology into people’s daily lives, are two reasons people are more concerned now about privacy issues, according to the survey commissioned by the Privacy Commissioner.
“These results paint a picture of the current state of privacy in New Zealand and shows to me that Kiwis aren’t as complacent as our well-advertised ‘she’ll be right’ attitude might indicate,” said Privacy Commissioner Michael Webster.
The percentage of people who said they are “more concerned” about privacy issues over the last few years has increased to 55%, which is a 14% increase from two years ago.
“Increasing public awareness about the use of Facial Recognition Technology and some of the issues being expressed about it seem to be a having an impact, as people become aware that this is happening and start asking, “is this the society I really want to live in?”
New Zealanders are clear, stated the Privacy Commissioner, in their response to these concerns:
- 80% want more control and choice over the collection and use of their personal information.
- 63% said protecting their personal information is a major concern in their lives.
- 83% want to know when their personal information is used in automated decision-making.
- 82% want the right to ask a business to delete their personal information.
“These increases line up with what we also heard from Kiwis about specific privacy issues, with the highest levels of concern among survey respondents being organisations sharing data, the use of AI in decision-making, and cyber-attacks,” said Mr Webster.
Widespread concerns over use of FRT in retail
According to the survey results, there are high levels of concern around several key privacy issues with around two thirds of New Zealanders concerned about:
- businesses or government organisations sharing their personal information without telling them (67%)
- the public and private sectors using artificial intelligence to make decisions about them, using their personal information (66%)
- organisations losing their personal information in a cyber-attack (65%).
Around two thirds of survey respondents (64%) also said they were very concerned about not being told about or agreeing to the use of Facial Recognition Technology.
In a key finding of the survey, 49% of respondents stated that they were concerned or very concerned about the use of facial recognition technology in retail stores to identify individuals. 22% were neutral on the topic, 25% were either not concerned or not really concerned, and 11% were unsure.
Those aged 30-44 were more likely to express concern about retail use of facial recognition (55%), and women were more likely to say they were concerned. Maori respondents also voiced a higher rate of concern (55%).
“Increasing public awareness about the use of Facial Recognition Technology and some of the issues being expressed about it seem to be a having an impact, as people become aware that this is happening and start asking, “is this the society I really want to live in?”
The concerns raised in relation to the use of facial recognition technology (FRT) in retail stores come at a time when Foodstuffs North Island is in the midst of a trial of live FRT across 26 of its supermarkets.
Concerns driving action
The results also indicated that privacy concerns drive behaviour. The survey asked whether in the last 12 months the recipients had avoided doing specific activities because of privacy concerns. The top avoided activities were social media 33%, online browsing 28%, online shopping 28% and online dating 28%.
Responses indicated that people are not just aware but they’re also acting upon it. In the survey, 70% declared that they were likely to consider changing service providers in response to poor privacy and security practices.
“Our survey also showed Māori are more concerned about privacy in every way,” said Mr Webster. “A standout example of the privacy concerns expressed by Māori is that 32% stated that in the past 12 months they have avoided contacting a government department due to privacy concerns. For non-Māori that figure is 14%.”
