October 2024
Police in Belize have temporarily paused their deal with U.S. facial recognition company Biometrica following concerns over moving data overseas.
The project was created to improve the tracking and identification of suspects in the popular Central American tourist destination. The collaboration, however, would have required sharing the county’s criminal database, including biometric fingerprint data, with Biometrica.
Belize Police Commissioner Chester Williams said that the agreement is on hold while they are looking for ways to keep data from Belizeans from being taken abroad. If this is not possible, Belize will look for a different software provider, the commissioner added.
“Perhaps if it is that they can develop a software and then we just get that software without the exchanging of data where we can keep our data in-house then we may be able to go with that,” says Williams. “But even the company itself had also called to say that they could not go through with the agreement because of some issue with the software they had developed.”
Williams also noted that Biometrica’s software is facing issues in other Caribbean countries, as reported by the local news outlet Channel 5 Belize. Biometric Update has reached out to the company for more information.
Biometrica has been working with law enforcement agencies in the U.S. The company’s eMotive criminal background checking software was integrated by the International Center for Missing and Exploited Children (ICMEC) to track potential child abductors and traffickers with facial biometrics.
Belize has been working on a national biometric strategy that was approved by the Cabinet in June.