It's a very good question. I would say it is increasingly used. It is a technology that can have a lot of benefits, and I think individuals and organizations are realizing that.
There are a few different applications. A lot of them have to do with security, such as verification using facial recognition. For example, when you're logging in to your phone or your computer, often that is done through a facial recognition tool now. Frictionless and contactless check-in at airports would be another example of how facial recognition is being used, which has been particularly important over the last couple of years during the depths of the COVID crisis, obviously.
Beyond that, I think there are some really beneficial applications in the accessibility context. There are a number of organizations doing really interesting research around how you can use facial recognition to help those who are blind or with low vision better understand and interact with the world around them. We had a project called Project Tokyo, which involved facial recognition, and it used a headset so that a blind individual would be able to scan a room—let's say a canteen or an open space at work—and if there was someone who had enrolled in the system and consented to be part of this individual's facial recognition system, he or she would be able to identify that person and be able to go over proactively and start a conversation in a way that would be very difficult otherwise.
Another application that I think a lot of people in the accessibility community are excited about is facial recognition for people with Alzheimer's or similar diseases that make it increasingly difficult to remember or recognize friends and loved ones. You can imagine the way in which facial recognition is now being explored to help prompt individuals to be able to recognize those friends and loved ones.
It's becoming a long answer, but I'll round off by saying there are also positive applications in the law enforcement context as well. We do think that as part of the criminal investigation process, facial recognition, with robust safeguards around it, can be a useful investigative tool. It's also being used for online identification of missing and trafficked individuals, including children, in a way that has been very beneficial as well.
There are some real benefits there, but, again, there are the challenges that I also mentioned, which is why you need a regulatory framework that can realize those benefits in a way that addresses the challenges.