The conversation around biometrics can be dizzying. IFA readers know about Amazon’s $10 offer for palm prints, purportedly to ease and enhance customer experiences. Leaving sales, marketing, and consumer efficiency to the side for the moment, there are also those who laud the use of biometrics for national security, law enforcement, and fair distribution of aid to those in need.

But then you come across a headline like this: “Afghans Scramble To Delete Digital History, Evade Biometrics.” Among the many goods captured by the newly re-empowered Taliban following America’s withdrawal, biometric data and devices are reportedly among them.

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The group cited by that Reuters piece, Human Rights First, wrote on its website, “We understand that the Taliban is now likely to have access to various biometric databases and equipment in Afghanistan, including some left behind by coalition military forces. This technology is likely to include access to a database with fingerprints and iris scans, and include facial recognition technology.”

Fingerprints, irises, facial features… these and other distinct physical characteristics are unique to each person and — unlike a last name or even a social security number — are very difficult to fabricate or evade. And that, of course, is the nature of their appeal to governments and other organizations.

For more than a decade the U.S. military had been using equipment known as Handheld Interagency Identity Detection Equipment (HIIDE) to collect and confirm biometrics of Afghans. Originally, its primary purpose was to find enemy agents, but eventually it came to be used for identifying those Afghans working to support U.S. forces and the Afghan government.

One Human Rights First official, Welton Chang, told The Intercept, “I don’t think anyone ever thought about data privacy or what to do in the event the [HIIDE] system fell into the wrong hands.”

Well, now those questions are very important as this critical information could well be in some of the most dangerous “wrong hands” in the world. As one report in The Conversation notes, “Registering in a biometric database means trusting not just the current organization requesting the data but any future organization that may come into power or have access to the data.” That report also indicates the Taliban has already used biometric checks during traffic hold-ups in 2016 and 2017 to identify and even execute those they considered enemies. What might they do if they have now acquired U.S. data and equipment?

This is a crisis for Afghans who aided the U.S. and potentially to others especially repulsive to the Taliban — like Christians. Kelsey Zorzi of ADF International wrote in The Hill recently that many of the 10,000-plus Afghan Christians are converts from Islam and therefore could face death sentences under Sharia law. Many already know Taliban agents are actively pursuing them.

Zorzi added, “Without any clear plan from the United States to evacuate Afghans under special threat, not to mention the remaining thousands of American citizens, Afghan Christians and many other religious minority groups are stranded…. Without knowing how sophisticated the Taliban’s tracking capabilities are, Christians are turning off their phones to avoid surveillance and have started moving to undisclosed locations.”

Again, we don’t know what information the Taliban has. But, unfortunately, those tracking capabilities could be very, very good.

Let’s pray today for our brothers and sisters in Christ in Afghanistan, and for the thwarting of nefarious use of biometrics by the Taliban or any other force.

May we be mindful, too, that as we explore new technology like biometrics for security, efficiency, or even just fun, that we don’t do so without proper consideration and safeguards.

What is your prayer about this serious risk?

Aaron Mercer is a Contributing Writer with two decades of experience in Washington, D.C.’s public policy arena. Picture Credit: Getty Images.