A survey by a Beijing research institute indicates growing pushback against facial recognition in China.

Axar.az reports citing BBC.

Some 74% of respondents said they wanted the option to be able to use traditional ID methods over the tech to verify their identity.

Worries about the biometric data being hacked or otherwise leaked was the main concern cited by the 6,152 respondents.

Facial recognitions systems are being rolled out in stations, schools, and shopping centres across the country.

The survey, first reported in the West by The Financial Times, was released on Thursday by the Nandu Personal Information Protection Research Centre.

It has been described as being one of the first major studies of its kind into public opinion on the subject in mainland China.

Some 80% of respondents said they were concerned that facial recognition system operators had lax security measures.

Separate research suggests that they have good reason to be concerned.