Governments and law enforcement are increasingly using facial recognition programs for a variety of uses and raising serious concerns about privacy and due process.

But not all government entities are dancing to the new, Big Brother-ish tune. In Maine, lawmakers are working on legislation that would bar state and local officials from using facial recognition programs. As the Tenth Amendment Center’s Mike Maharrey reports:

Rep. Grayson Lookner (D-Portland)  introduced House Bill 1585 (LD1585) on April 28. The legislation would ban public employees and officials, including law enforcement officers, from obtaining, retaining, possessing, accessing, or using a facial surveillance system or information derived from a facial surveillance system with some exceptions. It would also ban state agencies from entering into agreements with third parties to obtain facial recognition information.

An amendment approved in the Joint Committee on Criminal Justice and Public Safety would allow police to use facial recognition in the investigation of a few serious crimes, including murder and rape. An amendment also excluded iris scans from the ban.

The committee passed LD1585 by a 9-0 vote.

Last year, voters in Portland, Maine banned the local use of facial recognition technology. More recently, King County, Washington banned facial recognition technology on the grounds that it is “invasive, intrusive, racially biased and full of risks to fundamental civil liberties.”

Nationally, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others are working to stop governments from using facial recognition tech because it is “a dangerous technology with a proven ability to chill essential freedoms and amplify systemic bias.”

It’s also the preferred tool of tyrants to control their populations. And on that front, China is leading the way in using facial recognition to publicly humiliate citizens, and herd others into internment camps.