San Francisco, CA Privacy & Surveillance: Facial Recognition Ban (2026)

2(d) reaches both the tool and its output. First, no City Department may obtain, retain, access, or use any Face Recognition Technology on City-issued software or on a City-issued product or device. Second, no Department may obtain, retain, access, or use any information obtained from Face Recognition Technology on City-issued software or a City-issued product or device. That second prohibition closes an obvious workaround: a Department cannot sidestep the ban by consuming the results of face recognition run elsewhere, because the information itself is off limits, not just the software.

The subsection opens with the words "notwithstanding the provisions of this Chapter 19B," which means it overrides the rest of Chapter 19B. Other surveillance technologies in San Francisco can be approved through Chapter 19B's ordinary process; Face Recognition Technology on City equipment cannot be approved at all. The prohibition is expressly subject to the exceptions in subsections (e) through (g) and the qualifications in subsections (h) through (l), and those exceptions are narrow. Inadvertent, unsolicited receipt of facial recognition data from an outside source is excused if it is logged, and a stock manufacturer-installed feature that cannot be deleted or used does not put a City device out of compliance.

Active use of the technology for identification remains banned outright. The rule was enacted through Ordinances 103-19 and 107-19 in 2019 and sits on top of Chapter 19B's broader surveillance oversight scheme.