By Ashanti Lee Seabron
(WAYNE COUNTY, Mich.) Livonia's Riverside Arena skating rink is under scrutiny for its utilization of facial recognition software that resulted in a teenager being banned from the rink for an alleged brawl there.
Per Fox 2 Detroit, Lamya Robinson, who is Black, and her family are considering legal action against the skating rink for what they believe was racial profiling.
"To me, it's basically racial profiling," said the girl's mother, Juliea Robinson. "You're just saying every young Black, brown girl with glasses fits the profile and that's not right."
Last Saturday, Lamya's mom dropped her off at the skating rink to hang out with friends. However, staffers wouldn't allow her to enter and said she was banned after her face was scanned.
With the scan, the arena accused Lamya of being involved in a brawl at the skating rink back in March.
Lamya spoke about the situation, saying "I was so confused because I've never been there."
Recently, facial recognition technology has come under fire for its misidentifications. Robert Williams, one of the first in the country to be misidentified and wrongfully arrested over the technology, testified about the matter on Capitol Hill on Tuesday.
The Robinson family says Riverside made Lamya leave the building after misidentifying her, which they believe put her safety at risk. Robinsons say they are thankful the situation did not lead to an unnecessary interaction with police.
In a statement given to Fox 2 Detroit, RA discussed the situation by saying:
"One of our managers asked Ms. Robinson (Lamya's mother) to call back sometime during the week. He explained to her, this our usual process, as sometimes the line is quite long and it's a hard look into things when the system is running."
"The software had her daughter at a 97 percent match. This is what we looked at, not the thumbnail photos Ms. Robinson took a picture of, if there was a mistake, we apologize for that."