Wegmans has introduced biometric data collection technology to its stores in New York City. The company did not respond to questions about whether it would do the same in its Upstate New York stores. Credit: Patrick McCarthy | Central Current

Wegmans’ quiet disclosure of biometric surveillance in New York City locations has caught the attention of Albany lawmakers.

Senator Rachel May, whose 48th District comprises most of Syracuse and portions of surrounding areas, earlier in 2025 sponsored a bill in the state legislature to ban biometric surveillance in places of public accommodation, such as grocery stores. The legislature on Wednesday began its 2026 session.

May called Wegmans’ use of biometric surveillance a civil liberties concern, and said such technology — oft-maligned by critics and civil liberties advocates for higher error rates among people of color, especially women of color — can facilitate discrimination.

“We know that biometric surveillance is much more accurate with certain demographics than others, and so we end up with a lot of mistaken identity and false flags,” May said. “It’s also really intrusive into our lives. Basically, it’s collecting information about us in ways that I think are not consistent with a free and open society.”

Wegmans will not say whether the biometric surveillance it introduced in New York City this month will come to Central New York locations — or if it is already here.

The company has not responded to Central Current and other outlets asking if it is storing facial scans and other biometric identifier information on customers in the Syracuse metropolitan area, or if it intends to do so in the future, instead sending reporters the same statement outlining that the brand is surveilling its customers to “enhance safety”.

The popular grocery chain, founded in Rochester, courted controversy earlier this month when signage outside select New York City locations quietly announced the store was using surveillance technology to scan each and every entering individual’s face, eyes, and voice.

From 2012 to 2020, pharmaceutical chain RiteAid’s use of facial recognition technology resulted in thousands of false-positive scans, according to a Federal Trade Commission report. The individuals falsely flagged as persons of interest were surveilled more, detained by law enforcement, or banned from RiteAid’s stores altogether.

The FTC claimed the company’s facial recognition software was particularly error-prone in RiteAid locations near predominantly Black and Asian neighborhoods. In December 2023, the FTC banned RiteAid from using facial recognition software in its stores without “reasonable safeguards.”

After the Gothamist on Monday published a report on Wegmans’ new signage, spokesperson Deanna Percassi sent Central Current a statement downplaying the grocer’s use of powerful biometric surveillance technology on its own customers. Percassi also walked back some of the language on the signs seen in New York City, saying Wegmans’ surveillance cameras don’t collect data through “retinal scans or voice prints.”

“Images and video are retained only as long as necessary for security purposes and then disposed of,” Percassi said. “For security reasons, we do not disclose the exact retention period, but it aligns with industry standards.”

Percassi did not answer a Central Current reporter’s questions on what the industry standards are for data retention. The Syracuse Police Department’s retention period for data collected by license plate readers is 30 days, unless that data is flagged and stored longer for investigative purposes.

Percassi did not respond when asked if the company plans to respond to a letter issued by Monroe County Legislator Rachel Barnhart, who excoriated the company for its quiet rollout of powerful biometric scanners.

“Wegmans has built its brand on trust and community connection,” Barnhart wrote. “That trust depends on transparency that meets people where they are — not disclosures they discover only because a city law forces the issue.”

Barnhart encouraged the company to reconsider its use of biometric scanners altogether, and called on Wegmans to adopt policies that respect “customer privacy, dignity, and informed consent.

The Monroe County legislator also asked Wegmans to respond within 30 days to questions about Wegmans’ collection and management of its customers’ biometric data. 

May said she has not heard from Wegmans, but expects the brand might contact her as she works to pass legislation that would prohibit its biometric surveillance. Absent that ban on surveillance in public accommodation, May said she is “absolutely” concerned that Wegmans’ peers and competitors might soon follow suit.

“Proliferation and monetization of it… tracking us for our habits. It’s already happening online, and it’s happening to us and as we walk around,” May said. “You can imagine the dangers of that, both in terms of companies trying to capitalize on knowing where we are at any given time, and in terms of the limitations that can be put on individuals.”

May said she wouldn’t be surprised if Wegmans was using the technology elsewhere in New York State, in jurisdictions that don’t have legislation mandating the disclosure of surveillance.

In New York City, a local law requires businesses to disclose the use of such biometric technology to customers. Percassi, the Wegmans spokesperson, cited that law in her statement explaining why Wegmans posted the signs outside of some of its stores in that city.

“In a small fraction of our stores that exhibit an elevated risk, we have deployed cameras equipped with facial recognition technology. In New York City, we comply with local requirements by posting the mandated signage to notify customers about the technology,” Percassi wrote in the statement.

Percassi has not responded to questions from Central Current and other publications asking if the controversial technology is in use in Wegmans locations beyond New York City.

For advocacy groups like the New York Civil Liberties Union — which submitted testimony in 2021 encouraging the city to strengthen the disclosure law — small signs outside of a business are insufficient to alert customers of biometric surveillance within. 

Daniel Schwarz, a senior privacy and technology strategist at the NYCLU, told the New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection that there is “no substitute for individual, informed opt-in consent” as he outlined suggestions for more conspicuous signage announcing biometric surveillance to customers.

“Without meaningful levels of detail and specificity, the rules risk to desensitize people to the sign and normalize pernicious data collection in the everyday lives of New Yorkers,” 

Because the three nearest Wegmans locations are just outside city limits, Syracuse lawmakers don’t have the ability to replicate that New York City surveillance disclosure law — but they are still concerned by the recent actions from one of the area’s main grocery options.

City Councilor Jimmy Monto, who is working to remove surveillance technology company Flock Safety from Syracuse, said he supports May’s legislation. If Wegmans is using or plans to use biometric scanners in Central New York, Monto said he would want to know the company’s motives and whether it is properly disclosing such surveillance to its clientele.

“I would question anyone collecting this kind of data as to what the intent is,” Monto said. “especially when it is a grocery store where several of my constituents shop.”

Though Wegmans has no locations in Syracuse, it has several in Onondaga County, and May believes county lawmakers could replicate the New York City disclosure law if they are concerned about Wegmans surveilling Central New Yorkers.

“A lot of these stores are located at the edges of the city, but not in the city,” May said. “But that doesn’t mean that there’s no governmental oversight. It’s just not the city of Syracuse.”

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Patrick McCarthy is a staff reporter at Central Current covering government and politics. A graduate of Syracuse University’s Maxwell and Newhouse Schools, McCarthy was born and raised in Syracuse and...