Facial recognition technology has faced increasing criticisms about its ethics, with concerns over privacy and racial prejudice and today we’ve learned that the company will stop using facial recognition software on its platform.
Facebook to stop using facial recognition
Until now, users had the option to let Facebook scan their face on the platform and notify them if someone shared a photo without permission.
Jerome Pesenti, the vice president of AI at Facebook stated that: “Amid this ongoing uncertainty, we believe that limiting the use of facial recognition to a narrow set of use cases is appropriate.”
According to a 2019 US government research, facial recognition algorithms were considerably less accurate in identifying African-American and Asian faces.
Last year, Facebook has been ended a legal battle due to its way to scan and tag photos. Since 2015, the lawsuit has dragged on, and a settlement was reached in which Facebook agreed to pay $550 million to a group of Illinois residents who alleged that its face recognition software violated their privacy rights.
Students will pay for their lunch using facial recognition in the UK
Amazon and Microsoft have both halted sales of facial recognition technology to law enforcement out of concern for the technology’s applications.
Last month, Frances Haugen, a former Facebook employee, accused the firm to promote hate speech for extra profit. Following a number of negative news stories about Facebook, the business announced a new name for the parent organization: Meta.
