Amazon Gives Police Access to Facial Recognition ‘The Washington post’ reported that Amazon Civil rights groups penned a letter to the company on Tuesday, fearing the technology could be abused. Civil rights groups in letter, via 'The Washington Post' An Amazon spokesperson issued a response, stating that the facial recognition services are to be used legally and responsibly by its customers. ‘Rekognition’ was first introduced as a marketing tool in November 2016, According to documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the tool can identify up to 100 people in a crowd.