The University of Waikato has confirmed it uses facial recognition technology for facility access control at its joint institute campus in Hangzhou, China. The system at the Waikato Joint Institute at Hangzhou City University controls building access but is not used for attendance tracking.
University officials clarified that this technology is only used at their Chinese operations, with no plans for implementation at New Zealand campuses. The university has not developed a formal policy on facial recognition since the technology is not used in their domestic operations.
The Chinese campus adopted facial recognition to match local institutional practices. “The operations of our offshore campuses are influenced by our partners in those institutions and use practices that are appropriate at that university,” the university explained.
The announcement follows recent discussions about facial recognition in education. At a Waikato University economic forum, data entrepreneur Brandon Hutcheson supported expanding such technology, pointing to potential efficiency gains in attendance tracking. Hutcheson suggested that traditional attendance checks take up significant time, estimating that “a child would waste half a school year during their entire education, on attendance checks.”
This deployment represents a broader trend in digital ID adoption on college campuses, as institutions work to balance security, convenience, and privacy concerns. Similar issues have emerged elsewhere, with Canadian privacy watchdogs investigating the use of facial recognition in schools for attendance and access control.
The University of Waikato’s implementation follows common practices in China, where facial recognition is widely used across various sectors. The university emphasizes that the system remains restricted to facility access control at their Chinese campus.
Source: RNZ
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February 15, 2025 – by the ID Tech Editorial Team
