A legal settlement between the American Civil Liberties Union and a facial recognition company has been hailed as a huge win by both parties.
The big story is that Clearview can no longer sell its databases to third party companies.
The suit was filed in 2020. It was alleged that Clearview had failed to comply with the Illinois privacy act.
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Taylor Hatmaker recently wrote about it.
According to the terms of the Clearview settlement, which is still in the process of being finalized by the court, the company will be nationally banned from selling or giving away access to its facial recognition database to private companies and individuals.
This doesn't stop Clearview from working with government entities outside of Illinois.
The media see this as a win for privacy. It makes little difference to the company, as Hoan Ton-That told CNN in a statement.
Clearview AI’s posture regarding sales to private entities remains unchanged. We would only sell to private entities in a manner that complies with BIPA. Our database is only provided to government agencies for the purpose of solving crimes.
Since day one, the legal team of Clearview has been fighting lawsuits like this. The CEO is aware of the ever-dwindling stomach for public-facing facial recognition systems.
It had stopped third-party sales of its databases prior to the settlement. It will almost certainly continue to sell its technology to third-party companies.
The company was never set up to be the best at selling facial recognition systems. We can imagine that Amazon's Ring division would have already made its way to the top of the space if it had its own brand of easy-use-surveillance.
The only thing the company has is lucrative government contracts.
It has been doing that since day one. It works with many law enforcement agencies around the world.
This is more of the same, and not good for privacy.
The problem is that the US government wants a service from Clearview. It turns out the US doesn't regulate artificial intelligence.
It is easy for the government to play along with Clearview's pseudo-altruistic promises to keep its technology out of civilian hands. Civil rights and privacy need an asymmetrical technological order to be suppressed.
When a regime change results in the criminalization of freedoms previously taken for granted, the panacea is the recognition that privacy is just as important as it is when you think you have nothing to hide.
The American Civil Liberties Union has gone a long way towards making people feel like Clearview is less dangerous than it actually is.
If you think you have nothing to hide, you should read this.
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