Google favors temporary facial recognition ban as Microsoft pushes back

The regulation of facial recognition is emerging as a key disagreement among the world's biggest tech companies, with Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai suggesting a temporary ban, as recently suggested by the EU, might be welcome, while Microsoft's chief legal officer Brad Smith cautions against such intervention. "I think it is important that governments and regulations tackle it sooner rather than later and give a framework for it," Pichai said at a conference in Brussels on Monday, reports Reuters. "It can be immediate but maybe there's a waiting period before we really think about how it's being used ... It's up to governments to chart the course." But in an interview published last week, Smith, who also serves as Microsoft's chief legal officer, was dismissive of the idea of a moratorium. "Look, you can try to solve a problem with a meat cleaver or a scalpel," Smith told NPR when questioned about a potential ban.