Facial recognition biometrics is favored by a majority of individuals when applying for a driver license and for law enforcement when investigating crimes, according to a poll from Zogby Analytics.

Some 78% of those surveyed favor the use of the technology when an individual is applying for a driver licenses. Thirty-five states have deployed the technology to make sure individual’s don’t have multiple driver licenses under different names and to make sure the photo of the individual at the DMV matches the photo on record.

Law enforcement officials have used facial recognition to run a photo through a mug shot database to see if an individual has been arrested before. Some 83% of respondents favor the use of facial recognition in this use case.

The survey also asked who would use facial recognition most responsibly: the federal government, states government, social media or business and corporations. A third of the respondents trust the federal government the most followed by state government – 20% — business and then social media, 8% and 7% respectively. Almost a third don’t know who would use facial recognition technology most responsibly.

Overall, when it comes to better driver licenses, 83% support making sure the documents are secure to protect against terror attacks, underage drinking and identity theft. In addition, 83% are in favor of biometric background checks for transportation and warehouse workers who handle hazardous materials.

When it comes to the government’s reaction to the Boston Marathon bombing, 52% of respondents said that it was positive, while 42% said the reaction was negative. When it came to protecting citizens’ privacy in the aftermath, 49% said it was positive and 41% responded negatively.

Zogby was commissioned by MorphTrust USA to conduct the survey of 1,000 U.S. adults.

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