{"schema_version":"0.10.0","id":"LR-2026-0518","record_version":1,"title":"New Orleans police continue live face recognition despite city law","verification":{"human_verified":false,"method":"automated_gate","auto_verified":true,"score":41.5,"score_breakdown":{"source_authority":12.1,"independent_corroboration":7.0,"implicated_party_confirmed":0.0,"citation_integrity":14.0,"specificity":0.0,"completeness":2.56,"unhedged_language":3.75},"checks":{"schema_valid":true,"every_field_cited":true,"quotes_verbatim":true,"source_fetched":true,"distinct_incident":true,"dates_plausible":true,"sources_agree":true,"source_describes_incident":true,"severe_backed_by_source":true,"record_integrity":true,"eligible":true,"about_this_case":true},"gate_version":"gate-2026-10-18.7","cross_check_model":null,"cross_check_agreement":null,"duplicate_of":null,"verified_by":null,"verified_at":"2026-11-01","extraction_run_id":null,"evidence_level":{"level":"preliminary","reason":"Publisher not yet named · subject to change","original_document":null,"reports_total":1,"reports_independent":0,"reports_derivative":0,"developing":false,"disputed":false,"rules_version":"evidence-2026-10-29.1","computed_at":"2026-11-01","history":[{"date":"2026-11-01","from_level":null,"to_level":"preliminary","reason":"Publisher not yet named · subject to change"}]},"sources_hash":"a7225aefb7bc7f6f136070e5cbc57d6cdb23f47c6c1854ae9ba207f9c29fae31"},"system":{"model_name":null,"model_version":null,"developer":"unknown","harness":null,"tools_granted":[],"permissions_scope":null,"autonomy_level":"unknown","guardrails_present":[],"deployment_context":"unknown","tier":null,"lifecycle_stage":null,"integration_type":null,"intended_use":null,"safeguard_state":null,"production_intended":null},"event":{"date_occurred":null,"date_disclosed":"2026-04-29","incident_class":"other","failure_class":null,"agent_involved":null,"secondary_failure_classes":[],"trigger":"unknown","duration":null,"detection_method":"public_researcher","summary":"New Orleans police officers used live face recognition through Project NOLA, a private organization that runs the camera network and watch lists without a contract with the department. City law allowed only limited investigative use and banned use as a surveillance tool. A Washington Post investigation revealed the program last year, and it was claimed to be paused. Records obtained by a privacy researcher show officers still sent photos to Project NOLA to locate suspects at least as of November 2025. The police department dismissed a complaint, saying the requests were not a use of face recognition. The system’s security was also reported as poor, with suspect videos sent through publicly accessible folders and shared passwords.","tags":[],"date_detected":null,"near_miss":null,"root_cause":null,"root_cause_detail":null,"failure_class_detail":null,"responsible_party":null,"adversarial_actor":null,"input_provenance":null,"time_to_contain":null,"operations_paused":"Claimed paused; records show use continued after the claimed pause","remediation":null,"precursor_events":null},"impact":{"direct_loss_usd":null,"remediation_hours":null,"records_exposed":null,"third_parties_affected_count":null,"severity":"moderate","harm_class":[],"affected_description":null,"protected_class_involved":null,"data_categories_exposed":[],"loss_range_usd":null,"reversibility":null,"downstream_exposure_count":null},"evidence":{"sources":[{"url":"https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/new-orleans-face-recognition","publisher":"American Civil Liberties Union","date":"2026-04-29","type":"press","title":"New Orleans Police Continuing to Use Live Face Recognition Despite City Law - American Civil Liberties Union","archived_url":null,"attachment":"first_report"}],"per_field_confidence":{"event.detection_method":"C","event.operations_paused":"C","context.country":"C","event.incident_class":"D","impact.severity":"D","event.summary":"C","system.autonomy_level":"D","system.deployment_context":"D","event.trigger":"D","system.developer":"D","event.date_disclosed":"D","context.denominator_available":"D"},"field_citations":{"event.detection_method":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Earlier this year, we were contacted by a privacy researcher, Matthew Wollenweber, who has filed complaints and obtained thousands of pages about this program from the New Orleans Police Department via open records requests."}],"event.operations_paused":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"A troubling New Orleans face recognition program revealed by a Washington Post investigation last year continues to operate despite violating a city law and a claim that it has been paused, and is being used in more problematic ways than first reported, according to emails obtained through an activist’s public records requests."}],"context.country":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Since then, despite improvements in the technology, we have not seen an effort to introduce live face recognition in any US city* — until Project NOLA."}],"event.incident_class":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"New Orleans police officers, however, have used — and appear to be continuing to use —live face recognition through an organization called Project NOLA."}],"impact.severity":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"New Orleans police’s use of this system was secret for two years, the Post reported, and played a role in dozens of arrests, but those arrested were not informed of the unreliable technology’s use, and it violated a city law that permitted limited use of the technology in investigations but imposed guardrails and conditions, including a ban on its deployment as a “surveillance tool.”"}],"event.summary":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"New Orleans police officers, however, have used — and appear to be continuing to use —live face recognition through an organization called Project NOLA."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"Has no contractual relationship with the NOPD."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"A troubling New Orleans face recognition program revealed by a Washington Post investigation last year continues to operate despite violating a city law and a claim that it has been paused, and is being used in more problematic ways than first reported, according to emails obtained through an activist’s public records requests."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"New Orleans police’s use of this system was secret for two years, the Post reported, and played a role in dozens of arrests, but those arrested were not informed of the unreliable technology’s use, and it violated a city law that permitted limited use of the technology in investigations but imposed guardrails and conditions, including a ban on its deployment as a “surveillance tool.”"},{"source_index":0,"quote":"Emails obtained by Wollenweber confirm that at least as of November 2025 officers were continuing to send photos to Laguarde to locate suspects using the Project NOLA face recognition system in violation of New Orleans’s law after the supposed “pause” in the cooperation program."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"Wollenweber filed a complaint against the officers revealed to be sending photos to Project NOLA, but the police department ludicrously claimed that the requests didn’t constitute a “use” of facial recognition technology, and dismissed the complaints."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"He found it was sending videos of suspects over unsecured, publicly accessible Google drive folders, many of which he recently verified were still accessible."}]},"notes_on_gaps":"The sources describe face recognition used by police through a private operator, not an autonomous AI agent, so agent_involved, failure_class and autonomy fields are left out. No model, developer, harness or tools are stated. The ACLU source is a press report relying on a researcher's records and says it has no proof of current use; the 'continuing' status after November 2025 is inferred by the ACLU, not confirmed. The NOPD denial and complaint dismissal are reported by the ACLU, not by a primary record. The Washington Post article is not among the sources. Exact dates of occurrence, the number of persons affected beyond 'dozens of arrests', records exposed, and losses are not stated. Severity is judged as moderate because data of others was touched and the scope is partly bounded (one city, dozens of arrests), though the source does not state a count of affected third parties of two or more meeting the major test. Deployment context is judged as production from the statement of live use. Detection method is judged as public_researcher from the researcher's records, though the initial revelation came from the Washington Post. No remediation was reported; the police chief's stated intent is not a reported change. Control outcomes are judged from the reported gaps and attributed to Project NOLA as the operator. [case created by the backfill: read by claude-haiku-5-5, backfill-2026-11-01.2, 2026-11-01; not yet reviewed] [2026-11-01: evidence level set: Preliminary (Publisher not yet named · subject to change)]"},"context":{"industry":null,"org_size_band":null,"country":"US","denominator_available":false,"denominator":null,"related_incident_ids":[],"systemic_exposure":null,"shared_model_id":null,"upstream_incident_id":null,"incident_evidence":null,"regulatory":null,"coverage":null},"narrative":{"steps":[{"step":"caught","text":"A privacy researcher obtained thousands of pages of records through open records requests and filed complaints.","quote":"Earlier this year, we were contacted by a privacy researcher, Matthew Wollenweber, who has filed complaints and obtained thousands of pages about this program from the New Orleans Police Department via open records requests.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"}],"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"backfill-2026-11-01.2","extracted_at":"2026-11-01","source_urls":["https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/new-orleans-face-recognition"]},"analysis":{"sections":{"timeline":[{"text":"A Washington Post investigation revealed the program.","quote":"A troubling New Orleans face recognition program revealed by a Washington Post investigation last year continues to operate despite violating a city law and a claim that it has been paused, and is being used in more problematic ways than first reported, according to emails obtained through an activist’s public records requests.","source_index":0,"when":"last year"},{"text":"Officers were still sending photos to Project NOLA to locate suspects, after the claimed pause.","quote":"Emails obtained by Wollenweber confirm that at least as of November 2025 officers were continuing to send photos to Laguarde to locate suspects using the Project NOLA face recognition system in violation of New Orleans’s law after the supposed “pause” in the cooperation program.","source_index":0,"when":"2025-11"},{"text":"An email from the Project NOLA operator tells a detective that the system will soon be switched back on for NOPD and that an account was reactivated.","quote":"In a November 5, 2025 email, LaGarde tells a NOPD detective that “Kirkpatrick visited my office yesterday, things went well, and I believe that we will soon be able to switch PN [Project NOLA] back on to the NOPD.”","source_index":0,"when":"2025-11-05"}]},"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"backfill-2026-11-01.2","extracted_at":"2026-11-01","source_urls":["https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/new-orleans-face-recognition"]}}