I 
118TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. R. 9954 
To prohibit use of remote biometric surveillance technology on any data 
acquired by body-worn cameras of law enforcement officers, and for 
other purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
OCTOBER 11, 2024 
Mr. BEYER (for himself and Mr. LIEU) introduced the following bill; which 
was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary 
A BILL 
To prohibit use of remote biometric surveillance technology 
on any data acquired by body-worn cameras of law en-
forcement officers, and for other purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Facial Recognition 
Ban on Body Cameras Act’’. 
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress finds the following: 
(1) Facial recognition and other remote biomet-
ric surveillance technologies pose unique and signifi-
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cant threats to the civil rights and civil liberties of 
Americans. 
(2) The use of facial recognition and other re-
mote biometric surveillance is the functional equiva-
lent of requiring every person to show a personal 
photo identification card at all times in violation of 
recognized constitutional rights. This technology also 
allows people to be tracked without consent. 
(3) It would also generate massive databases 
about law-abiding Americans, and may chill the ex-
ercise of free speech in public places. 
(4) Facial recognition and other remote biomet-
ric surveillance technology has been repeatedly dem-
onstrated to misidentify women, young people, peo-
ple with disabilities, transgender people, and people 
of color and to create an elevated risk of harmful 
‘‘false positive’’ identifications. 
(5) Facial and other remote biometric surveil-
lance would corrupt the core purpose of officer-worn 
body-worn cameras by transforming those devices 
from transparency and accountability tools into rov-
ing surveillance systems. 
(6) The use of facial recognition and other re-
mote biometric surveillance would disproportionately 
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impact the civil rights and civil liberties of persons 
who live in highly policed communities. 
(7) Its use would also diminish effective polic-
ing and public safety by discouraging people in these 
communities, including victims of crime, undocu-
mented persons, people with unpaid fines and fees, 
and those with prior criminal history from seeking 
police assistance or from assisting the police. 
SEC. 3. PROHIBITING USE OF FACIAL RECOGNITION TECH-
NOLOGY AND OTHER REMOTE BIOMETRIC 
SURVEILLANCE SYSTEMS. 
(a) FEDERAL FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE.—Beginning 
on the first day of the first fiscal year beginning after the 
date of the enactment of this Act, a State or unit of local 
government is ineligible to receive Federal financial assist-
ance under the Byrne grant program under subpart 1 of 
part E of title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe 
Streets Act of 1968 unless the State or unit of local gov-
ernment is complying with a law or policy that is substan-
tially similar to the prohibition set forth in section 4. 
(b) RULE OF CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this sec-
tion may be construed to preempt or supersede any Fed-
eral, State, or local law that imposes a more stringent lim-
itation than the prohibition set forth in section 4. 
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SEC. 4. FEDERAL PROHIBITION. 
A Federal law enforcement agency may not use facial 
recognition technology or other remote biometric surveil-
lance systems on any image, video, or audio acquired by 
body-worn cameras of law enforcement officers. 
SEC. 5. DEFINITIONS. 
In this Act: 
(1) BIOMETIC
SURVEILLANCE
SYSTEM.—The 
term ‘‘biometric surveillance system’’ means any 
computer software or application that performs fa-
cial recognition or other remote biometric surveil-
lance. 
(2) BODY-WORN
CAMERA.—The term ‘‘body- 
worn camera’’— 
(A) means an officer camera or similar de-
vice that records or transmits images or sound 
and is attached to the body or clothing of, or 
carried by, a law enforcement officer, including 
mobile phones; and 
(B) includes smart glasses and similar de-
vices that include cameras attached to the 
frame of a piece of eyewear. 
(3) FACIAL
RECOGNITION.—The term ‘‘facial 
recognition’’ means an automated or semi-automated 
process that assists in identifying an individual, cap-
turing information about an individual, or otherwise 
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generating or assisting in generating surveillance in-
formation about an individual based on the physical 
characteristics of the individual’s face. 
(4) OTHER
REMOTE
BIOMETRIC
SURVEIL-
LANCE.—The term ‘‘other remote biometric recogni-
tion’’— 
(A) means an automated or semi-auto-
mated process that— 
(i) assists in identifying an individual, 
capturing information about an individual, 
or otherwise generating or assisting in gen-
erating surveillance information about an 
individual based on the characteristics of 
the individual’s gait, iris, fingerprint, or 
other characteristic ascertained from a dis-
tance; 
(ii) uses voice recognition technology; 
or 
(iii) logs such characteristics to infer 
emotion, associations, activities, or the lo-
cation of an individual; and 
(B) does not include identification based 
on fingerprints or palm prints when such infor-
mation is collected onsite via traditional phys-
ical means (as opposed to fingerprint recogni-
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tion systems that identify an individual based 
on a photo on which their finger is visible). 
(5) USE.—The term ‘‘use’’— 
(A) means— 
(i) the direct use of a biometric sur-
veillance system by a law enforcement offi-
cer or a law enforcement agency; or 
(ii) a request or agreement by a law 
enforcement officer or law enforcement 
agency that another law enforcement agen-
cy or other third party use a biometric sur-
veillance system on behalf of the request-
ing officer or agency; 
(B) includes— 
(i) running a biometric surveillance 
system in real time on images, video, or 
audio collected by a body-worn camera; 
and 
(ii) running a biometric surveillance 
system on images, video, or audio collected 
by a body-worn camera after the data has 
been collected, such as while reviewing 
footage during the course of an investiga-
tion; and 
(C) does not include— 
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