Serie A CEO Luigi De Siervo believes facial recognition scanning at stadiums is the next step to tacking racism and violence in Serie A. The league is still plagued with racist and territorial discrimination, as evidenced by this weekend’s match between Napoli and Lazio.
The idea of introducing scanners at stadiums had already been touted some months ago, with De Siervo, CEO of the Football League, having talked about it in the spring.
Now “facial recognition at the stadium” (as it already happens in airports) is more than just a proposal, but a real project of Serie A against racism and violence. Speaking at the “Football Social Responsibility – Strategy 2030,” organized in Milan, De Siervo expanded his thoughts on the potential implementation, saying:
“To identify perpetrators, biometric data is valuable. To combat racism and violence much has been and is being done, but to achieve true detectability of the perpetrators we need facial recognition for those accessing the facilities.”
The initiative is reportedly already under consideration by the League and will soon be submitted to the government as well, after further internal investigation. The draft plan calls for the proposed signing of a waiver to those who purchase a stadium “ticket”, be it a ticket or a season ticket, for the use of their biometric data, limited to necessary uses, which can range from opening turnstiles to certain and quick detection of violent and racist people.
