Turnbull will on Thursday push the Premiers and Chief Ministers at a special terrorism-focused Council of Australian Governments (COAG) meeting in Canberra to set up a national facial recognition database and bring in nationally uniform periods of detention for suspects of up to 14 days. "So, having a national database so that can all be integrated and accessed in real time is, I think, a logical next step." In dismissing privacy concerns, Turnbull also earlier told the ABC's AM program, "The alternative is to not use data at all." Asked if "safety trumps privacy in these matters", Turnbull responded, "No, safety and privacy go hand in hand." Law enforcement agencies are backing a national facial recognition database with the understanding the access has to be for a "lawful purpose".

Source: Huffington Post October 04, 2017 02:53 UTC