Use of facial recognition/ biometrics technology and privacy and law

Use of facial recognition/ biometrics technology and privacy and law

The key is to use the deliberation process suggested in the legal case analysis to draw your conclusion from fact gathering, formulation of issues, identification of applicable laws, through your analysis.

1. Set up the platform on which you want to tackle the topic of your interest

a. Significance analysis of your topic

b. Social need to know the direction

c. Background information

d. Competing arguments on the topic,

2. Existing cases directly related to your topic

a. Supreme Court Cases if there is any

b. Federal laws if there is any

c. Cases within the federal appellate court jurisdiction (Texas is within the 5th Federal Appellate Court jurisdiction)

d. Cases within nearby federal jurisdictions (e.g., Oklahoma is within the 10th Federal Appellate Court jurisdiction)

e. Cases within the state of Texas

f. Keep in mind that under the Supremacy Clause and the Doctrine of Preemption, whether express or implied, federal law will almost always prevail when it interferes or conflicts with state law, except in circumstances where the federal law is deemed unconstitutional, or where the Supremacy Clause does not apply.

3. Facts for the issue of your topic in your interest

a) Please lay out the facts by following their chronological order, e.g, a fact that occurred in 2010 should be presented before another fact that occurred in 2015,…

b) Please lay out the facts by following their logical order, e.g., a fact that occurred prior to another event should be accordingly presented as it was, rather than it is; e.g., John drove a car and hit Jeff, a pedestrian walking across the street, Jeff filed a suit against John. Jeff becomes a plaintiff, and John becomes defendant because the law suit has been filed. Prior to the law suit, neither Jeff nor John can be labeled as a plaintiff or a defendant.

c) Please lay out the facts by following your perceived level of relevancy, e.g., present the most relevant fact first, and the second most relevant after, … quite often, when you present in this way, you will find out it is easy to meet the relevancy sufficiency test, and you don’t need to add more facts to build your analysis,…

d) Please lay out the facts by following the level of importance, e.g., the present the most important fact first, and the second most important after, … quite often, when you present in this way, you will find out it is easy to meet the importance sufficiency test, and you don’t need to add more facts to build your analysis,…

4. The single or at most 2-3 issues in your project

a. What issue your project attempts to reconcile or solve?

b. An issue statement is the one that begs for an answer, and it must be a general statement that is applicable to other similar situations, and it is a “whether – statement”; it has to contain the basic elements of generalized situation in which a subsequent analysis will provide an answer.

c. In the issue statement, one is often tempted to start an analysis here; but it is not the timing yet.

5. Summary of Applicable Law

a. Summary of laws, starting with those from the highest court decisions and/or codified federal statutes down

b. Whenever there is a clear cut from the directions in law, stop and use that law or that set of laws because of the Supremacy Clause and the Doctrine of Preemption

6. Analysis

a. Basically, you use the presented facts (pertinent to the issue) in comparison with the identified applicable law to see if the facts are in alignment with the existing law. If yes, you move forward to draw your conclusion.

b. If not, how much discrepancy out there, try to use the law in a similar jurisdiction to reconcile the difference

c. If the issue is in its novelty, and no man-made law has ever covered, please try to apply the natural law method of governance (some of it are “common sense” ones, or basic logic ones, or no internal conflict ones, etc)

7. Conclusion and Practical Implication.

a. By this point you should find an answer to your issue statement.

b. What if for its applicability in other similar situations in future

c. This section should give you of some sense of confidence in your ability to deal with another issue when you gradually gain the experience in following the same approach in analysis.