New Orleans Surveillance/FR Rules
New Orleans Surveillance Technology and Data Protection Ordinance (Ch. 147), as Amended 2022
New Orleans, LA · New Orleans, La., Code ch. 147, as amended July 21, 2022
- Status
- In effect
- Applies to
- City of New Orleans agencies, principally NOPD
- Enforced by
- New Orleans City Council (quarterly reporting and oversight)
New Orleans banned facial recognition, predictive policing, and cell-site simulators in December 2020, but the council partially repealed the ban in July 2022, letting police use facial recognition (with human review and reporting) for serious violent crimes. In 2025 it emerged NOPD had received real-time facial recognition alerts from a private camera network in violation of these rules; alerts were paused in April 2025 and a proposal to authorize real-time FR was withdrawn, leaving the 2022 rules in place.
Who is protected: New Orleans residents and visitors
Legal detail
New Orleans Code of Ordinances ch. 147 (Ordinance 33021, Dec. 2020), as amended July 2022, permits NOPD facial recognition requests only for enumerated violent offenses, routed through the Louisiana fusion center with trained-examiner review and quarterly council reporting.
Key facts
| Jurisdiction | New Orleans, LA |
|---|---|
| Level | City / local |
| Strength | Limited |
| Enacted | December 17, 2020 |
| Citation | New Orleans, La., Code ch. 147, as amended July 21, 2022 |
| Topics | facial recognition · biometric data · police and surveillance AI · government use of AI · consumer data privacy · AI disclosure and transparency · data retention |
| Statute | New Orleans Code of Ordinances Chapter 147 (Municode) |
More AI rules in New Orleans, LA
Related facial recognition rules elsewhere
- Virginia § 15.2-1723.2 (facial recognition by local law enforcement, eff. July 1, 2026) · In effect
- Bristol VA PD facial recognition program (first VA local agency) · In effect
- Dallas PD Clearview AI facial recognition policy · In effect
- Ban biometric recognition in public accommodations (Ban The Scan) · Proposed / pending
- Limit facial recognition in residential buildings (Ban The Scan) · Proposed / pending
- Texas v. Google · In effect
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