Tue 15 February 2022:
The state of Texas filed a lawsuit against Facebook’s parent corporation Meta on Monday, alleging that its facial recognition system collected people’ biometric data without their consent.
According to Attorney General Ken Paxton, Facebook acquired biometric information from images and videos without the users’ knowledge, calling it an example of “big tech’s deceitful business practices.”
However, Meta spokesperson said the “claims are without merit” while vowing to “defend itself vigorously”.
Mark Zuckerberg’s company had declared last year that it would be shutting down its facial recognition system and would delete people’s information. Two years ago it had agreed to pay $650 million in a similar privacy case. It was said to be the largest ever settlement of a privacy lawsuit at the time.
The Illinois lawsuit was filed in 2015 over Facebook’s photo-tagging feature as it used the facial recognition system as attorney Edelson asserted that “biometrics along with geolocation were the two primary battlegrounds”.
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In a similar move, the Texas lawsuit said Facebook had captured biometric identifiers of Texans “without consent not hundreds, or thousands, or millions of times but billions of times.”
“Facebook will no longer take advantage of people and their children with the intent to turn a profit at the expense of one’s safety and well-being,” Paxton said.
Facebook has been criticized for a number of reasons. After leaking data demonstrating the social network’s impact on youth and users’ well-being last year, whistleblower Frances Haugen said that adults regard Facebook content as “boring, misleading, and negative.” Facebook, on the other hand, dismissed Haugen’s allegations.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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