Inside Utah’s facial recognition system: How police use the technology

SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — Utah law enforcement agencies are increasingly using facial recognition technology to identify criminal suspects, but state law limits its use to specific circumstances and imposes some of the strictest safeguards in the nation.

Under Utah law, facial recognition technology may only be used for certain law enforcement purposes, including felony investigations, violent crimes, threats to human life, and efforts to identify deceased, incapacitated or at-risk individuals.

The technology recently came under scrutiny in the case of Brad Johnston, who faced a felony charge related to the vandalism of an Uber driver’s vehicle after a facial recognition match linked him to the case. Johnston maintained he was not involved.

“The only way I can describe it was just terrifying,” Johnston said.

MORE: Facial recognition AI misidentifies Utah man in felony vandalism case

The match was generated from surveillance video taken from inside the Uber ride, but Johnston insisted investigators had identified the wrong person. After months of court proceedings, the case was ultimately dismissed.

According to the most recently available data, Utah law enforcement agencies submitted 1,191 facial recognition requests between July 1, 2024, and June 30, 2025. Of those, 706 resulted in probable matches, a rate of about 59%.

State law requires all facial recognition requests to be processed through the Utah Department of Public Safety.

Tanner Jensen, chief of investigations for the department, said requests from law enforcement have increased over the past five years.

Jensen said the system will analyze biometric data and measurements and two people manually review each image submitted for comparison. The process results in one of two outcomes: a possible match or no result. Once findings are returned to the requesting agency, the department’s involvement ends.

“If they do both feel like the match is viable, they’ll send that to the officer for further investigation with a disclaimer that this is an investigative lead and not necessarily something that’s part of the evidence,” Jensen said.

Most identifications are generated through comparisons with a driver’s license photographs. Jensen said biometric characteristics remain consistent over time, but human review is still critical.

“You may get a percentage below 90%, but that’s not to indicate that that’s not the individual,” Jensen said. “Or you may get a percentage that’s above 90% and we still don’t feel confident that that would be the individual. It really comes down to the human-in-the-loop aspect.”

Retired Salt Lake City Police Chief Chris Burbank said law enforcement agencies have adapted quickly to emerging technologies, much as they did when body-worn cameras were introduced.

“The technology is just moving so fast and furious,” Burbank said. “One of the things is the availability of AI to analyze a large database.”

Burbank said strong policies must guide the use of technology in policing.

“We need to ensure, again, is this policy sound for the public or is it just good for policing?” he said.

_____