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(NEW YORK) — The United Nations Human Rights chief on Wednesday called for a moratorium on the sale of and use of artificial intelligence technology that poses human rights risks — including the state use of facial recognition software — until adequate safeguards are put in place.

The plea comes as artificial intelligence develops at a rapid clip, despite myriad concerns ranging from privacy to racial bias plaguing the emerging technology.

“Artificial intelligence can be a force for good, helping societies overcome some of the great challenges of our times. But AI technologies can have negative, even catastrophic, effects if they are used without sufficient regard to how they affect people’s human rights,” U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said in a statement Wednesday.

Bachelet’s warnings accompany a report released by the U.N. Human Rights Office analyzing how artificial intelligence systems affect people’s right to privacy — as well as rights to health, education, freedom of movement and more.

“Artificial intelligence now reaches into almost every corner of our physical and mental lives and even emotional states,” Bachelet added. “AI systems are used to determine who gets public services, decide who has a chance to be recruited for a job, and of course they affect what information people see and can share online.”

The report warns of the dangers of implementing the technology without due diligence, citing cases of people being wrongly arrested because of flawed facial recognition tech or being denied social security benefits because of the mistakes made by these tools.

While the report did not cite specific software, it called for countries to ban any AI applications that “cannot be operated in compliance with international human rights law.” More specifically, the report called for a moratorium on the use of remote biometric recognition technologies in public spaces — at least until authorities can demonstrate compliance with privacy and data protection standards and the absence of discriminatory or accuracy issues.

The report also slammed the lack of transparency around the implementation of many AI systems, and how their reliance on large data sets can result in people’s data being collected and analyzed in opaque ways as well as result in faulty or discriminatory decisions. The long-term storage of data and how it could be used in the future is also unknown and a cause for concern, according to the report.

“Given the rapid and continuous growth of AI, filling the immense accountability gap in how data is collected, stored, shared and used is one of the most urgent human rights questions we face,” Bachelet said.

“We cannot afford to continue playing catch-up regarding AI — allowing its use with limited or no boundaries or oversight, and dealing with the almost inevitable human rights consequences after the fact,” Bachelet said, calling for immediate action to put “human rights guardrails on the use of AI.”

Digital rights advocacy groups welcomed the recommendations from the international body, especially as many nations lag in implementing federal laws surrounding artificial intelligence.

Evan Greer, the director of the nonprofit advocacy group Fight for the Future, told ABC News that the report further proves the “existential threat” posed by this emerging technology.

“This report echoes the growing consensus among technology and human rights experts around the world: artificial intelligence powered surveillance systems like facial recognition pose an existential threat to the future [of] human liberty,” Greer told ABC News. “Like nuclear or biological weapons, technology like this has such an enormous potential for harm that it cannot be effectively regulated, it must be banned.”

“Facial recognition and other discriminatory uses of artificial intelligence can do immense harm whether they’re deployed by governments or private entities like corporations,” Greer added. “We agree with the UN report’s conclusion: there should be an immediate, worldwide moratorium on the sale of facial recognition surveillance technology and other harmful AI systems.”

Multiple studies have indicated that facial recognition technologies powered by artificial intelligence have the potential of racial bias and false negatives. Just last summer, a Black man in Michigan was wrongfully arrested and detained after facial recognition technology incorrectly identified him as a shoplifting suspect.

A sweeping 2019 study from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology found a majority of facial recognition software on the market had higher rates of false positive matches for Asian and Black faces compared to white faces. A separate 2019 study from the U.K. found that 81% of suspects flagged by the facial recognition technology used by London’s Metropolitan Police force were innocent.

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(NEW ORLEANS) — As Hurricane Ida wreaked havoc in New Orleans, it swept away a historic jazz landmark that Louis Armstrong once considered a second home.

“The message that boosting might soon be needed, if not justified by robust data and analysis, could adversely affect confidence in vaccines and undermine messaging about the value of primary vaccination,” the officials wrote, backed by other worldwide organizations.

For their part, the Biden administration has emphasized that science will lead and federal regulators will have the final say — and that their call to push out booster shots is motivated by wanting to “stay ahead” of the virus.

“You don’t want to find yourself behind playing catch up,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said when announcing the plan. “Better stay ahead of it than chasing after it.”

The Karnofsky Tailor Shop and Residence, which was built in 1913, collapsed after water pooled on its roof. According to the National Park Service, a young Armstrong worked for the family who owned the shop and loaned the future jazz legend money to buy his first cornet — a brass instrument that resembles a small trumpet.

“That is another devastating blow to the community, so much history there [that] once again, a hurricane has come in and just kind of washed away,” Kia Robinson, the director of programs and marketing at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation, told ABC News.

Ida destroyed homes and businesses, knocked out power to more than 1 million residents and left at least 82 people dead. It hit Louisiana as a Category 4 hurricane on Aug. 29 — almost exactly 16 years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the city that is known as the birthplace of jazz.

‘Insult to injury’

Before Ida, the jazz community was already reeling from the ongoing pandemic, which has shut down music venues, canceled shows and left many in the music community without an income or a lifeline.

“New Orleans is very much so a gig town, you know, people work performance to performance, gig to gig, so a lot of our musicians don’t have a safety net,” Robinson said.

When the pandemic hit in March 2020, Robin Barnes Casey, known as the Songbird of New Orleans, lost all of her bookings, and all of her international tours as a cultural ambassador to the city were canceled.

At the time, she and her husband, musician Pat Casey, who perform as the duo LoveBirds, had just become new parents to baby Riley.

“All of a sudden, everything we could do financially [to support our family] was just stopped,” Barnes Casey said.

“It was definitely mentally, emotionally an exhausting time and then also being brand new parents, we had a challenge and a blessing,” she added.

As COVID-19 vaccines became widely available this spring, some musicians were able to book some gigs again. But amid a surge in cases in Louisiana and the emergence of the delta variant, the city again had to take a step back.

Gov. John Bel Edwards reinstated the mask mandate in August, and large gatherings like the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, which was scheduled to run in October, were canceled again this year.

For New Orleans saxophonist Derek Douget, Ida has added “insult to injury.”

“COVID took away all the gigs, [and] then the hurricane comes in, not only taking the gigs or prospects of gigs away, but it’s destroyed your property,” Douget told ABC News as he helped his parents deal with hurricane damage to their home.

The Jazz Foundation of America deployed teams of volunteers to assess needs and provided financial assistance to thousands of musicians — from direct payments to fulfilling need-based requests, most recently providing those who lost power during Ida with generators and fuel tanks.

“We have a long history, a long and painful one, of working with musicians in Louisiana and throughout the South during these natural disasters,””Jazz Foundation of America executive director Joseph Petrucelli told ABC News.

The Jazz Foundation of America raised over $2 million for its COVID-19 relief fund, while the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation supported more than 2,500 in the Louisiana jazz community through grants.

“During 2020 we assisted more musicians and more families across the country than we did in any year previous,” Petrucelli said. “This was because we’re dealing with such widespread deprivation and devastation and loss of work that the need was really universal.”

‘We celebrate life’

When Katrina struck New Orleans in 2005, Barnes Casey was 17, and as she left her home in New Orleans amid the destruction, she found hope in music.

“Music has always been my salvation and my therapy and my happiness,” she said. “I survived mentally through Katrina because I listened to music all the time.”

This is why, despite all of the roadblocks before them, the Caseys — along with thousands of other musicians — were determined to keep the music going, despite the pandemic and despite Ida, through uplifting virtual performances.

And according to Petrucelli, many were able to raise relief funds to support the music community through their efforts. “There’s just been so much, so much goodwill and kindness,” he said.

“It was such a blessing for us, because we were able to still do what we loved, we were able to still perform and make people happy,” Barnes Casey said. “[Music] can make people mentally check out and think about the beauty of the world and forget the sorrows of the world.”

And the sorrows for the jazz community amid the pandemic have been immense. The human toll of the virus touched every corner of the jazz world as dozens of jazz musicians and producers died of COVID-19, including New Orleans jazz legend Ellis Marsalis.

For Douget, Marsalis’ death in April 2020 was particularly painful.

Douget was a member of the Ellis Marsalis Quintet for 25 years and first met Marsalis when he was 17. He considered him a mentor and a friend.

“He was a true intellectual, just intellectually curious all the way to the end of his life. Losing him was devastating,” Douget said. “He was like a father figure to me and to a lot of the musicians, particularly the ones that played in his band.”

Just last week, prominent New Orleans musician Bennie Pete, a founding member of the Hot 8 Brass Band, became the latest member of the city’s jazz community to die of COVID-19.

Even amid great loss, Barnes Casey said the resilient spirit of New Orleans and its music community continues to uplift.

“Despite that’s all going on, [New Orleans] is such a unique place, because we celebrate life so much. We even, you know, we celebrate funerals, but it’s more about celebrating the life that we’re sending off,” she said.

And in that spirit, Douget continues to teach the next generation of musicians, carrying on the legacy of greats like Marsalis who dedicated their lives to jazz education.

“They had a profound influence on my life,” Douget said. “They showed me that, of course, learning your instrument and learning the craft, all that is important, but it’s just as important to pass it along to the next generation of young people. And that’s what their lives were about. That’s what they did. And I tried to basically model my life on theirs.”

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