Fear of nothing to hide? How do Chinese people feel about privacy when facing facial recognition cameras?

Abstract

ABSTRACT Facial-recognition cameras are becoming increasingly important for governments around the world to help maintain public security and improve public services. Despite these benefits, previous studies have shown that facial-recognition cameras may also cause risks such as privacy violations. This study explores how citizens respond to government-sponsored facial-recognition cameras in terms of privacy concerns in China, which is a country with a well-established digital system. By using a national survey combined with facial-recognition camera data, this study reveals that the presence of government-sponsored facial-recognition cameras does not lead to increased information privacy concerns among Chinese citizens. Instead, citizens in China are generally very willing to accept facial-recognition cameras built by governments, and this acceptance increases when citizens’ trust in companies and government institutions is greater. Our study suggests that the application of facial-recognition cameras has probably been normalised because people are more likely to consider the social and economic advantages of such application over the downside, specifically that related to privacy intrusion.