BREAKING: Taylor Swift got MSG to turn off facial recognition for her wedding. What about the rest of us?

WIRED just broke the news that facial recognition scanners were turned off during Taylor Swift’s wedding at Madison Square Garden, leaving us wondering—why do billionaires get opt out of this dangerous and discriminatory tech while other patrons are aggressively surveilled for simply being trans or getting on James Dolan’s bad side?

This comes after 404 Media uncovered a three-page dossier on Fight for the Future’s Director Evan Greer in a folder titled “facial recognition activists” including time-stamped screenshots making it clear someone working for Madison Square Garden was keeping close tabs on our activism.

Fight for the Future is leading prominent campaigns to end the use of facial recognition and other AI surveillance in music venues and ban it from all places of public accommodation. Dozens of high profile artists including members of Rage Against the Machine and Bikini Kill have joined our pledge to boycott venues that use AI surveillance.

James Dolan’s venues: Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music Hall, and The Sphere are among the only concert halls in the United States that use facial recognition surveillance. A small handful of gay bars in San Fransisco recently started using face scanning tech, and are facing instant backlash.

Here’s a short statement attributable to Evan Greer, director of Fight for the Future:

“This incident is a perfect encapsulation of the future we’re already living in: where wealthy elites are afforded privacy and the rest of us live in a surveillance dystopia. The fact that Madison Square Garden turned off its facial recognition system during her big day shows that James Dolan’s use of AI surveillance has nothing to do with safety and security. With almost no regulations, corporations and wealthy individuals use their surveillance empires to punish critics, target activists, discriminate against marginalized customers, and worsen conditions for workers. We need laws banning billionaires and corporations from using AI surveillance tech like facial recognition. Until then, artists and music fans must organize to boycott the tiny handful of venues that use this controversial tech. I’m glad that Taylor Swift was afforded privacy during her wedding. She should sign our pledge to boycott venues that use facial recognition, so that her fans can be afforded that same privacy.”

Fight for the Future is calling on artists and venues to pledge against using facial recognition, and for fans to boycott venues that use it, at https://www.banfacialrecognition.com/venues/.

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