Photo Tagging | Nones Notes

Is that Maria Callas? Check with Facebook -- they'll know. — Is that Maria Callas? Check with Facebook — they’ll know.

I blogged last year about privacy concerns surrounding Facebook’s “face geometry” database activities, which have led to lawsuits in Illinois under the premise that those activities run afoul of that state’s laws regarding the use of biometric data.

The Illinois legislation, enacted in 2008, requires companies to obtain written authorization from subjects prior to collecting any sort of face geometry or related biometric data.

The lawsuit, which was filed in early 2015, centers on Facebook’s automatic photo-tagging feature which has been active since around 2010. The “faceprints” feature – Facebook’s term for face geometry – recognizes faces based on the social network’s vast archive of users and their content, and suggests their names when they appear in photos uploaded by their friends.

The lawsuit was filed by three plaintiffs in a potential class-action effort, and it’s been mired in legal wrangling ever since.

From the outset, many had predicted that Facebook would emerge victorious. Eric Goldman, a law professor at Santa Clara University, noted in 2015 that the Illinois law is “a niche statute, enacted to solve a particular problem. Seven years later, it’s being applied to a very different set of circumstances.”

But this past week, a federal judge sided not with Facebook, but with the plaintiffs by refusing to grant a request for dismissal.

In his ruling issued on May 5^th, U.S. District Court Judge James Donato rejected Facebook’s contention that the Illinois Biometric Privacy Information Act does not apply to faceprints that are derived from photos, but only when it’s based on a source other than photos, such as in-person scans.

The Judge roundly rejected this contention as inconsistent with the purpose of the Illinois law. Donato wrote:

“The statute is an informed consent privacy law addressing the collection, retention and use of personal biometric identifiers and information at a time when biometric technology is just beginning to be broadly deployed. Trying to cabin this purpose within a specific in-person data collection technique has no support in the words and structure of the statute, and is antithetical to its broad purpose of protecting privacy in the face of emerging biometric technology.”

This isn’t the first time that the Illinois law has withstood a legal challenge. Another federal court judge, Charles Norgle, sided against Shutterfly recently on the same issues.

And Google is now in the crosshairs; it’s facing a class-action lawsuit filed early this year for its face geometry activities involving Google Photos.

Clearly, this fight has a long way to go before the issues are resolved.

If you have strong opinions pro or con about social networks’ use of face geometry, please share your views with other readers in the comment section below.

It had to happen eventually: Facebook’s “faceprints” database activities are now the target of a lawsuit.

The suit, which has been filed in the state of Illinois, alleges that Facebook’s use of its automatic photo-tagging capability to identify people in images is a violation of Illinois’ state law regarding biometric data.

Facebook has been compiling faceprint data since 2010, and while people may choose to opt out of having their images identified in such a way, not surprisingly, that option is buried deep within the Facebook “settings” area where most people won’t notice it.

Moreover, the “default” setting is for Facebook to apply the automatic photo-tagging feature to all users.

Carlo Licata, the lead individual in the class-action complaint filed in Illinois, contends that Facebook’s practices are in direct conflict with the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act. That legislation, enacted in 2008, requires companies to obtain written authorization from persons before collecting any sort of “face geometry” or related biometric data.

The Illinois law goes further by requiring the companies gathering biometric data to notify people about the practice, as well as to publish a schedule for destroying the information.

Here’s how the lawsuit states its contention:

“Facebook doesn’t disclose its wholesale biometrics data collection practices in its privacy policies, nor does it even ask users to acknowledge them. With millions of users in the dark about the true nature of this technology, Facebook [has] secretly amassed the world’s largest privately held database of consumer biometrics data.”

The response from Facebook has been swift – and predictable. It contends the lawsuit is without merit.

As much as I’m all for of individual privacy, I suspect that Facebook may be correct in this particular case.

<em>Brave New World:</em> Biometrics — Brave New World: Biometrics

For one thing, the Illinois law doesn’t reference social networks at all. Instead, it focuses on the use of biometrics in business and security screening activities — citing examples like finger-scan technologies.

As Eric Goldman, a professor of law at Santa Clara University notes, the Illinois law is “a niche statute, enacted to solve a particular problem. Seven years later, it’s being applied to a very different set of circumstances.”

And there’s this, too: The Illinois law deals with people who don’t know they’re giving data to a company. In the case of Facebook, it’s commonly understood user data is submitted with consent.

That may not be a particularly appealing notion … but it’s the price of gaining access to the fabulous networking functionality that Facebook offers its users – all at no expense to them.

And of course, millions of people have made that bargain.

That being said, there’s one nagging doubt that I’m sure more than a few people have about the situation: The folks at Facebook now aren’t the same people who will be there in the future. The use of faceprint information collected on people may seem quite benign today, but what about tomorrow?

The fact is, ultimately we don’t have control over what becomes the “tower of power” or who resides there. And that’s a sobering thought, indeed.

What’s your own perspective? Please share your thoughts with other readers here.