Clearview AI Wants To Sell You Back Your Stolen Face.
Facial recognition startup Clearview AI is sorry that they got caught stealing your — and every other prole on the internet’s — facial likeness, and sold it to ministry-approved law enforcement.
But don’t worry, they really want to make it up to you! Unfortunately, they’re a little short right now, but Clearview’s imaginative legal team has drafted a class-action solution. Here’s the plan: You let these data collectors keep selling your personal likeness, thereby raising funds to pay the so-called victims a tidy sum!
If Clearview AI becomes profitable and this plan works, you stand to receive a small amount of money back in your pocket. Of course, whether the plan works or not, the aforementioned lawyers stand to be paid a large amount of money. The system works!
Big Brother recommends you embrace this generous offer, otherwise your info would have been stolen in vain, and nobody wants that.
Will this encourage more startups to shoot first and ask questions later with your precious personal data? Perhaps… maybe… probably. At least now you have some “skin in the game.” Even if that skin is your actual face.
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PRINTING JUST THE FACTS
- In 2020, private company Clearview AI was found to have scraped over 3B images from Facebook, Instagram, X, Tumblr, Venmo, YouTube, and millions of other websites, creating a photo database consisting of the majority of Americans’ faces.
- The app was then sold to businesses, individuals and government bodies, including over 600 law enforcement agencies – from local police to the FBI and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – to solve crimes, though critics have pointed out that the technology often misidentifies people.
- Police departments later became public promoters for the company, with some claiming it was better than government technology because it could identify people with partial, angled, or obstructed photos.
- Clearview AI faced a class-action lawsuit, but since it couldn’t afford to compensate everyone, it made a settlement, offering plaintiffs either a 23% stake in the company should it become publicly traded, or 17% of its revenue.
- A federal judge in June approved the settlement on the condition that the company stop selling its database to private businesses or individuals. However, the judge allowed law enforcement to continue using it outside of Illinois.
Sources: New York Times (a), New York Times (b), The Record, and Associated Press.
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