§18934 Biometrics research and testing

Summary

Creates a program for the Secretary, through the Director, to study and test biometric ID systems like facial recognition. The program must do research to measure and improve how these systems work. It can study things like image quality, device types, contactless capture, human-in-the-loop processes, and how well systems work together. The Director must bring together people from different groups to agree on common terms such as accuracy, fairness, bias, privacy, and consent. The work covers many biometric types (fingerprints, voice, iris, face, vein, behavior, genetics, multimodal, and new methods). The program will also look at privacy tools for sharing public data, share expertise with industry and standards groups, and create reference materials needed for voluntary technical standards. The Secretary, through the Director, must also run a testing program so vendors can try their biometric technologies. That program will do regular tests and research to check accuracy, effectiveness, and bias, including effects of demographics, capture devices, spoofing, partly blocked or computer-made images, privacy and security protections, template protection, de-identification, and comparisons of algorithm, human, and combined performance. It will develop methods for testing software and cloud/remote systems, set common use cases and performance measures, publish plain-language reports, make rules for working with a “foreign entity of concern” (see section 19221), and prioritize U.S.-headquartered vendors. The Comptroller General must, within 18 months after August 9, 2022, report to Congress on how these technologies affect historically marginalized communities (including low-income and minority religious, racial, and ethnic groups) and post that report online.