{
  "id": 280801,
  "title": "Rajya Sabha MP moves Supreme Court against use of facial recognition technology at NEET protests",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/07/rajya-sabha-mp-moves-supreme-court-against-use-of-facial-recognition",
  "topic": "tech",
  "section": "Tech",
  "published": "2026-08-07T20:30:56.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "The Hindu",
    "slug": "the-hindu",
    "url": "https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/rajya-sabha-mp-moves-supreme-court-against-use-of-facial-recognition-technology-at-neet-protests/article71276424.ece"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "On July 28, 2026, Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament A.A. Rahim filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the use of facial recognition technology and mass surveillance by the Delhi Police during protests against the NEET-UG exam paper leaks. The petition, represented by advocate Subhash Chandran, requested a judicial declaration that the surveillance was unconstitutional. Rahim argued that the deployment of facial recognition technology and other surveillance measures on peaceful protestors without valid legal grounds violated their right to privacy under Article 21 of the Constitution. The Delhi Police employed CCTV cameras, drones, mobile command and control vehicles, and hand-held devices to capture videos and photographs of the protesters. The real-time processing of this data using the 'Ikshana' vehicle and 'AjnaLens' smart spectacles, along with the collection and matching of fingerprints through the National Crime Records Bureau's 'Abhigyan' mobile application against the National Automated Fingerprint Identification System, occurred without a valid law. Neither the Delhi Police's standing orders nor the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act, 2022 authorized such biometric surveillance during a lawful assembly. The petition claimed that the surveillance was conducted in a complete legal vacuum, with no privacy impact assessment conducted and an unvalidated 80% similarity score considered a positive match.",
  "summary": "A Rajya Sabha MP, A.A. Rahim, has moved the Supreme Court against the use of facial recognition technology at NEET protests. According to The Hindu, Rahim seeks the apex court’s intervention on the automated extraction and matching of biometric identifiers of thousands of peaceful protesters and the interlinking of such data with permanent national criminal databases, which he claims is in a complete legal vacuum.\n\nThere is no connection between this and reports about a US federal appeals court ruling on a Trump administration project. The administration had been ordered to stop construction on a $400m ballroom at the White House, with the court ruling that Congress must approve the project. The National Trust for Historic Preservation had sued the administration over the project, which was started without congressional approval.\n\nThe US Court of Appeals upheld a preliminary injunction against the project, with the majority saying that Congress, not the Executive Branch, should decide on such a project. The administration has appealed the decision, which may lead to a Supreme Court showdown.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 3,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "BBC News",
        "title": "US appeals court halts Trump ballroom project paving way for Supreme Court showdown",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/07/us-appeals-court-halts-trump-ballroom-project-paving-way-for-supreme",
        "published": "2026-08-07T16:31:54.000Z"
      },
      {
        "outlet": "MyJoyOnline Ghana",
        "title": "US appeals court halts Trump ballroom project paving way for Supreme Court showdown",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/07/us-appeals-court-halts-trump-ballroom-project-paving-way-for-supreme-276276",
        "published": "2026-08-07T17:58:10.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}