Areas of Strategic Visibility: Disability Bias in Biometrics

Yet many of these systems are not accessible to people who experience different kinds of disability exclusion. Different personal characteristics may impact any or all of the physical (DNA, fingerprints, face or retina) and behavioral (gesture, gait, voice) characteristics listed in the RFI as examples of biometric signals. We define disability here in terms of the discriminatory and often systemic problems with available infrastructure's ability to meet the needs of all people [UN 2017, Oliver, 2013). Using this definition, "[biometrics] could either mitigate or amplify disability depending on how they are designed." (Guo, 2019). As Whittaker and colleauges (2019) state, this is not simply a matter of algorithmic accuracy: "...discrimination against people of color, women, and other historically marginalized groups has often been justified by representing these groups as disabled . Thus disability is entwined with, and serves to justify, practices of marginalization." It is critical that we look beyond inclusion to full and fully accommodated participation.