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They’re not ready for their close-up.
A Garment District clothing company is forcing workers to submit to facial recognition scans for building access, outraging staff who ripped the mandate as “invasive” and questioned how their biometric data will be stored and used.
Employees at Isaac Morris Ltd. — a Midtown apparel company that produces licensed merchandise for brands like Disney and artists like Lady Gaga — got a surprise email last week from their IT department saying the old swipe-card entry system was being replaced with facial recognition, Simrran Bhatia, a brand licensing technologist at the company told The Post.
Staff were told someone would soon be coming around to “capture a scan” of their faces, the message said.
There was no updated policy, no consent form and no exceptions — just a heads-up that the change was coming, Bhatia, 27, said.
The only alternative mentioned, she noted, was entering a numeric code at the door, which most people find “less convenient” than a quick scan.
Another employee, who requested anonymity, said the change felt like “a total invasion of privacy.”
“We don’t even do anything super important … there’s literally no reason to be doing this other than to harass the employees,” they added, noting that employees largely work in administrative roles, customer service and basic operations and don’t understand why facial recognition is suddenly necessary.
The cameras and software are already installed in the lobby and in testing mode, with the system expected to go live next week, Bhatia said.
Bhatia said she and her colleagues want answers on how long their biometric data will be stored, who can access it and what safeguards will prevent unauthorized use.
“Could someone use our facial data or entry codes to gain access on our behalf?” she asked. “Without strict controls, our facial data could be circulated, repurposed or manipulated.”
IML did not respond to request for comment.
The sudden rollout raises red flags for surveillance experts.
“This isn’t just creepy. It might be illegal,” Albert Fox Cahn, executive director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, told The Post. “New York law already bans compelled fingerprinting of employees. Facial recognition is effectively creating a fingerprint of your face.”
The risks go beyond the office, and are part of a broader, and largely unregulated, rollout of biometric tech in the workplace, cybersecurity experts warn.
“Facial scans are immutable. Once compromised, they can’t be changed,” said Dave Meister, head of Global Channel and MSP at Check Point Software Technologies. “If this data is breached … the consequences can extend far beyond the workplace.”
A recent ExpressVPN survey found 67% of U.S. employers now use biometric tracking such as facial recognition and fingerprint scans.
At Google’s Washington campus, workers undergo facial scans at building entry, while Intel uses similar systems to scan thousands of employees at sites nationwide.
Amazon, one of the biggest users of workplace biometric surveillance, is facing a class-action suit over its Go stores for collecting palm and body-shape data without biometric warnings. The retail giant has also come under fire for using facial recognition to monitor warehouse workers and delivery drivers, Cahn said.
Privacy advocates warn these tools are sold as convenient but often double as surveillance, especially when consent is unclear.
“We’ve seen employers use biometric tracking incredibly invasively to monitor employee movements on the job,” Cahn said. “Breaking down their activity level by the second, tracking where they go, policing their time on a task. Sometimes they’re using it without even notifying their employees.”
Privacy protections for workers are minimal in New York, especially compared to states like Illinois, which require informed consent and limit how biometric data is stored.
“It’s just a wild west at this point,” said Daniel Schwartz, senior privacy and technology strategist at the New York Civil Liberties Union who noted that New York has no statewide laws protecting workers from biometric surveillance.
A City Council bill introduced in 2024 — Intro 217 — would ban most private employers in NYC from using facial recognition to track staff. The measure has majority support but has yet to be brought to a vote, Cahn told The Post.
“There’s a world of difference between using your face to unlock your phone and having your employer use it as a tracking tool,” Cahn said.