For
Last year, the Department of National Defense (DND) secretary Delfin Lorenzana,
terminated the 1989 UP-DND accord that prevents state forces (PNP and AFP) from
entering without permission from the UP admin (Talabong, 2021). This exacerbates the
problem of the suppression of academic freedom and red tagging being committed by the
national government against student leaders, progressives, activists, teachers, students etc.
Even before the UP-DND accord was terminated, military agents were already infiltrating
the campus to conduct surveillance and possibly harass activists. Back in 2015, military
agents were caught by the UP Diliman police (Macas, 2015). Because of this, it is highly
suggested that UP should continue building the facial recognition system as long as it will
be used to deter state forces from conducting surveillance and harassment to members of
the UP community. Since it might be possible for state forces to dress as civilians and roam
around the campus, a facial recognition system can tell whether a person is a member of
the UP community since it cannot recognize the state agent’s face in the database. The UP
Police will immediately be called to arrest or escort the state agents to the nearest PNP
station. Such an application of facial recognition was already implemented in Beijing
Normal University to prevent intruders from entering the dormitories. Some students
complain because of the inconvenience it causes. Some say that the response time is slow
while others praise it for its convenience because even if their faces do not get recognized
by the camera, they can just say their name and the speech recognition system will work
(Du, 2017).
References
Du, X. (2017, May 16). Facial recognition system introduced to Beijing Normal University
dorms. Retrieved from People's Daily Online:
http://en.people.cn/n3/2017/0516/c90000-9216437.html
Macas, T. (2015, October 22). Alleged military agents nabbed inside UP campus. Retrieved
from GMA News Online:
https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/topstories/metro/541616/alleged-militaryagents-nabbed-inside-up-campus/story/
Talabong, R. (2021, January 18). Duterte gov’t ends 1989 deal barring troops from UP.
Retrieved from https://www.rappler.com/nation/duterte-government-endsdepartment-national-defense-university-philippines-accord-january-2021/
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