High-Security Areas of NFL Stadiums to Use Facial Recognition System
The National Football League (NFL) in the United States has launched a facial recognition security protocol for sensitive areas in all of its stadiums for the 2024 season. The systems will use facial recognition to verify credentials from workers, press, and other game day personnel who have access to areas such as the field, locker rooms, press box, and other restricted areas of stadiums.
The Sports Business Journal broke the story on 25 July. The short article said the NFL ran a pilot program last year at six stadiums and will implement the system league-wide beginning with the preseason games occurring at NFL stadiums. These games start on 8 August.
“One of the biggest things is accountability,” Billy Langenstein, senior director of security services for the NFL, told the Sports Business Journal. “[The league and the teams] know every single person who is being credentialed to work an NFL game, who they are, and the access levels they should have to do their job. And a big part of it is accountability for those individuals, embracing it, learning it, and evaluating the safety and security of the program.”
The league-wide rollout is limited to those with credentials for higher security areas and is not for general ticket holders. False and misleading social media posts that either stated or implied that the NFL was requiring facial scans of all fans proliferated for days after the initial announcement. The original, correct characterization of the program reached thousands on social channels, but the false information reached millions.
It is not known if the NFL is considering wider use of facial recognition in the future. There are several examples of sporting venues moving to facial recognition for ticketing and concessions purchases. A National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security (NCS4) study from last year reported that fans are open to the technology if it improves venue security or significantly reduces entry time. At a Brazilian soccer stadium, facial recognition ticketing technology led to the arrests of several wanted criminals.
In the NFL, the Cleveland Browns have embraced facial recognition with the most fervor. The Sports Business Journal reported that the Browns principal owners—Dee and Jimmy Haslam’s Haslam Sports Group—have invested in Wicket, the company the NFL is using for facial recognition credentials. In 2020, the Browns started with a pilot facial recognition program to authenticate ticket holders, promising a speedier entry into the stadium.
The program was and remains voluntary. The team reported that 35,000 fans have enrolled in the program, and on game days in 2023 they averaged more than 10,000 entrances using facial authentication—better than 10 percent of total attendance.
“I’m hoping we can go all in next year and make facial authentication a preferred ticketing method,” Brandon Covert, vice president for information technology at the Cleveland Browns, told Stadium Tech Report. “It could really ease our operations and be a better experience for everyone.”
The intangibles of modern ticketing system deployment have become some of the most important factors influencing event success. Here are some takeaways learned from ticketing for the FIFA World Cup. https://t.co/qYyNL4ayzi
— Security Management (@SecMgmtMag) June 11, 2024
The NFL’s Atlanta Falcons and Major League Baseball’s New York Mets have similar systems in place.
In 2023 the Browns also piloted a program they called “Express Beer.” Users can scan their driver’s license to authenticate their age and use facial recognition at a stadium concession to skip the line to get a cold one. A midseason report from the Sports Business Journal said 300 people signed up, and a postseason article from Stadium Tech Report said the team recorded 5,000 transactions using the system.
The burgeoning technology remains controversial. The artificial intelligence used in facial recognition reportedly has bias issues, and the newly enacted European Union AI Act puts limits on facial recognition use.
