A look at Clearview AI, a facial recognition app claiming it scraped 3B+ images from sites like Facebook, YouTube, and that 600+ law enforcement agencies use it
Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day! Bogdan Popa / Softpedia News : FBI in Possession of Software Able to Profile Anyone Using Just a Picture Charlesarthur / The Overspill : Start Up No.1225: the facial recognition app to end them all, ranking the evil of companies … Abhimanyu Ghoshal / The Next Web : The next big privacy scare is a face recognition tool you've never heard of Stephen E. Arnold / Beyond Search : The Clearview Write Up: A Great Quote Khari Johnson / VentureBeat : From Washington State to Washington, D.C., lawmakers rush to regulate facial recognition Rafael Tihanyi / Café Con Tech ☕ : Café con Tech #48☕ - La Razón Por la Que Visa Adquirió Plaid Por $5.300 Millones Georgina Torbet / Digital Trends : Terrifying Clearview app could be the end of anonymity in public places Jon Fingas / Engadget : Law enforcement is using a facial recognition app with huge privacy issues Azeem Azhar / Exponential View : 🔮 Facial recognition; outskilling; reversing Eroom's law; network effects, miserable … Edward Moyer / CNET : Clearview app lets strangers find your name, info with snap of a photo, report says Craig Wilson / Input : New York-based startup Clearview AI can identify you with a photo Beryl Lipton / MuckRock : Records on Clearview AI reveal new info on police use Sasha Lekach / Mashable : A facial recognition company dug up billions of photos from Facebook and beyond Tweets: @nytimes : EXCLUSIVE: With a single photo, hundreds of law enforcement agencies in the U.S. can learn your name, where you live, and who you know. It will end your ability to walk down the street anonymously. https://www.nytimes.com/... Kashmir Hill / @kashhill : The privacy paranoid among us have long worried that all of our online photos would be scraped to create a universal face recognition app. My friends, it happened and it's here: https://www.nytimes.com/... Ron Wyden / @ronwyden : This story reads like one of the more disturbing episodes of Black Mirror. Americans have a right to know whether their personal photos are secretly being sucked into a private facial recognition database. https://twitter.com/... Rebecca / @romepix : “It is not possible to make a LASTING compromise between technology and freedom, because technology is by far the more powerful social force and continually encroaches on freedom through REPEATED compromises.” — Theodore Kaczynski https://twitter.com/... Grady Booch / @grady_booch : Bing reverse image search already does a good job at this. I tested a pic of myself that had never been uploaded to the Web, and @bing identified it as me. https://twitter.com/... ChuckModi / @chuckmodi1 : “600 law enforcement agencies have started using Clearview in past year. The computer code includes programming language to pair it w/augmented-reality glasses; The tool could identify activists at a protest revealing their names, where they lived, what they did & whom they knew” https://twitter.com/... @nytimes : .@kashhill got to see first hand how it works. When police officers ran a photo of her through the app, they soon received calls from Clearview asking if they were talking to the media. Read her investigation: https://www.nytimes.com/... Dare Obasanjo / @carnage4life : Genie is already out of the bottle with facial recognition. All the selfies we've posted & details we've shared on social media now fuel the police state. I still think this is trivial compared to when the other shoe drops on all the DNA data shared with 23andMe, Ancestry, etc. https://twitter.com/... Chris Tolles / @tolles : @Carnage4Life @TechmemeChatter I think this would need to be squared with the recent decision that scraping info is a protected activity. Personally, I think the focus should be on government use of photo & any social media data without a warrant Crypti-Calli / @iwillleavenow : PASS. A. LAW. Ban this. Ban it yesterday. I genuinely don't understand how people (even in law enforcement) can see this, shrug, and think it's fine. https://twitter.com/... Dare Obasanjo / @carnage4life : A simple law to prevent surveillance state style facial recognition would be to ban a person's photo & name from being fed into a facial recognition system without their permission. That plus GDPR/CCPA style rights to ask for your facial recognition data to be deleted. https://twitter.com/... Will Thomas / @gwilliamthomas : The project is financially backed by Peter Thiel. It's worth noting the former chief of staff at Thiel's venture capital firm is currently US Chief Technology Officer and has just rolled out a “light touch” regulatory framework for AI: https://www.wired.com/... https://twitter.com/... Mike Murphy / @mcwm : I think what struck me the most in this excellent piece is that Clearview AI just brazenly broke the terms of service of major social networks to build their database. What will be the repercussions be? Genie seems like it's out of the bottle now https://www.nytimes.com/... Andy Baio / @waxpancake : A Peter Thiel-funded startup is scraping every photo it can find online (3 billion so far) to build a powerful facial recognition app that it's selling to law enforcement. https://twitter.com/... Craig Silverman / @craigsilverman : Peter Thiel is connected to this company, which appears to violate Facebook's TOS. Thiel sits on FB's board. We reported a few weeks ago that FB is aggressively suing companies that abuse its TOS, so eager to see what action FB takes here: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/ ... https://twitter.com/... VR Nima / @nimazeighami : And there's code for it to work on AR glasses. Privacy has truly died. Cyberpunk fashion with face coverings needs to be a new standard. https://twitter.com/... @jacarandachick : Identified from photos you've never seen: “When I used my hand to cover my nose and the bottom of my face, the app still returned seven correct matches for me.” The Secretive Company That Might End Privacy as We Know It https://www.nytimes.com/... cc @aral #surveillancecapitalism Thorsten Benner / @thorstenbenner : “We've relied on industry efforts to self-police but dams breaking because there is so much money on table. I don't see future where we harness benefits of face recognition technology without crippling abuse of surveillance that comes with it. Only way to stop it is to ban it.” https://twitter.com/... Ryan Mac / @rmac18 : FB also declined to comment on Thiel's involvement citing it one of his “personal investments.” I followed up asking if it would hold board members accountable for funding companies that directly violate its rules and IP. Not sure I'll get comment, but waiting to hear back. Jonathan Zittrain / @zittrain : Researchers have objected that using bots to scrape information in bulk from, say, Facebook could be deemed a felony. If there were ever a case to make, though, this is it: a company snatching 3 billion photos to build a service to identify any stranger. https://www.nytimes.com/... Yashar Ali / @yashar : I've had two demos of Clearview & the results were frightening/stunning in their accuracy. Both demonstrations involved me giving blurry screenshots of a video & Clearview was able to identify both people (friends who had consented) even though they barely have a presence online https://twitter.com/... Davey Alba / @daveyalba : There are so many jaw-dropping moments in this @kashhill feature on law enforcement's use of face recognition tech from the secretive company Clearview AI (backed by Peter Thiel!) And the reporting goes so deep. I have reporter's envy. Everyone go read it https://www.nytimes.com/... pic.twitter.com/sw6gpi8ii7 Clint Watts / @selectedwisdom : Is this new? Or surprising? Is this article written in 2010? Law enforcement/gov use of this is the only one with oversight, what about private companies, that should really scare everyone. https://twitter.com/... Scott Hechinger / @scotthech : In other words, welcome to the reality already if you're Black or Latino living in targeted neighborhoods where wearing a certain color & walking down the street could land you on a gang database. Wonder if more people will care once they also become targeted. https://twitter.com/... David Sleight / @stuntbox : Massive, holy shit-level “caught with their hand in the cookie jar” moment 10 paragraphs into this NY Times piece about Clearview's facial recognition work for law enforcement: https://www.nytimes.com/... pic.twitter.com/4es0b58K4T Kashmir Hill / @kashhill : When I first started looking into Clearview AI, it had a nonexistent office address on its website & one fake employee on LinkedIn, and no one from company would return my calls. But they knew about me and were monitoring for cops who uploaded my photo to their app. https://twitter.com/... Christopher Bouzy / @cbouzy : The software engineer me: Wow this is amazing tech! The American citizen me: JFC this is scary tech. https://twitter.com/... Ian Miers / @secparam : How orwellian is clearview's new face surveillance app? Well, when the police demo'd it to a journalist by running their face through it, Clearview called them to see if they were talking to the media. https://twitter.com/... Joel Reidenberg / @jreidenberg : Anyone want to try a class action suit to shut down the company. Scraping probably violated TOS and makes a good 3rd party beneficiary claim for those in the photos. cc: @kashhill The Secretive Company That Might End Privacy as We Know It - NYT https://www.nytimes.com/... @aclu : This is the dangerous and disturbing reality of facial recognition today. Police should not be able to investigate and prosecute us by secretly running an error-prone and unregulated technology provided by a startup that shadily assembled a database of billions of face scans. https://twitter.com/... Joe Bernstein / @bernstein : A major takeaway from @kashhill's incredible story. Ethically-dubious companies have had the ability to create facial recognition tech on a terrifyingly vast scale for years. They haven't done so because even they recognized it was too evil https://www.nytimes.com/... pic.twitter.com/klXLlzb9Ue Kashmir Hill / @kashhill : When @Aaron_Krolik did a forensic analysis of the app, he discovered code to pair it with augmented reality glasses, so you could theoretically identify people in real time walking down the street. Yeah, like in Terminator 2. https://twitter.com/... Kashmir Hill / @kashhill : I'm not sure which is scarier/more desirable. An app that puts a name to a face in seconds, or an app that shows you all the online photos of you that you didn't realize were there. This app does both, but only law enforcement has access to it, for now. https://twitter.com/... David Carroll / @profcarroll : Sorta like how Palantir never got in trouble for collaborating with Cambridge Analytica... https://twitter.com/... Josh Orton / @joshorton : This is disgusting. A Sanders administration will ban facial recognition software in law enforcement, period. https://www.nytimes.com/... Alex Gladstein / @gladstein : Future historians will split human society into two eras: pre-surveillance and post-surveillance. Even more significant than B.C. vs A.D. Today we are living at the transition point. We're the ones with the responsibility, like it or not, for keeping privacy and freedom alive. https://twitter.com/... Kevin Kwok / @kevinakwok : Many stories on tech can be overblown. Not this one though I have seen this app in use and it 100% works and is even more disconcerting than description here Global facial recognition doesn't exist only because of social norms rn. The tech is trivial https://www.nytimes.com/... Dave Pell / @davepell : Important story. But companies don't end privacy. Decisions by leaders and indifference by citizens does. https://www.nytimes.com/... pic.twitter.com/mMrJvhkjmx David Enrich / @davidenrich : Exclusive: Hundreds of law enforcement agencies (incl @FBI and @DHSgov) have quietly started using a facial-recognition program that ends your ability to walk down the street anonymously. It's funded by @peterthiel and has links to alt-right. by @kashhill https://www.nytimes.com/... Robert Scoble / @scobleizer : I'm in so many databases it isn't funny. When I talk with friends I assume at least four governments are listening. Certainly many companies are. It's one reason why I mostly gave in. https://twitter.com/... Alex Stamos / @alexstamos : This seems like an important junction. If this hoovering up of facial data is considered a legally safe thing for VC-backed companies, then we are in big trouble. At a minimum, somebody needs to throw an elbow that discourages new competitors. cc @Riana_Crypto and @daphnehk Alex Stamos / @alexstamos : I assume Clearview has violated the copyrights of millions of people? Those people licensed Facebook to show their photos but that license doesn't flow through to somebody who violated ToS, I'm sure. Has there ever been a class-action on mass photo copyright? Alex Stamos / @alexstamos : FB has a history of going after scrapers using the civil component of the CFAA, but the 9th Circuit has repeatedly cut down the options there. This is an area where I have diverged from my friends at @EFF, who have fought to protect scraping. https://www.eff.org/... Ryan Mac / @rmac18 : I've asked Facebook for comment on Clearview AI and asked whether litigation is possible. Waiting to hear back. Here's what FB previously said to the Times. Reading the tea leaves here, it wouldn't be a shock if they eventually send a legal threat letter to Clearview. https://twitter.com/... Alex Stamos / @alexstamos : A really important story that demonstrates why @kashhill is the best privacy reporter working. Raises some interesting question: is there any legal way to slow down Clearview and discourage more investment into ubiquitous face recognition? https://twitter.com/... Charles Arthur / @charlesarthur : It's a viral hit - for police. Completely changes the game. UK police will want this too. And from 31 Jan, we're outside the EU, so any rulings about facial recognition bans there won't have any effect. https://twitter.com/... @popehat : cue all the “why would you care unless you have something to hide” folks https://twitter.com/... Aaron Weiss / @aweiss : There is a story here for every local news organization in the country. Which agencies are using Clearview? What rules do they have over when it can be used? Would they have any way to know if an officer is misusing it? (Answer: They would not.) https://twitter.com/... Jonathan Zittrain / @zittrain : A few years ago Facebook successfully sued a garden-variety Facebook spammer for nearly $1 billion. A Facebook that's serious about privacy would be looking similarly aggressively into how “Clearview AI” obtained the billions of photos it's using to identify strangers. https://twitter.com/... Stephanie / @isosteph : oh man this piece is so great but i wish it touched more on how totally unprepared the law is to handle this shit https://twitter.com/... Zeynep Tufekci / @zeynep : Read this and, well. Don't weep. Past time to rethink our sleepwalking technological path. 👇 https://twitter.com/... Ken Tremendous / @kentremendous : Delete your Facebook accounts. Delete your kids' Facebook accounts. Don't let your kids start Facebook accounts. And also — importantly — Peter Thiel drove Gawker into bankruptcy on a “privacy” issue and now he's literally funding the Surveillance State. Fuck that. https://twitter.com/... Doug Mack / @douglasmack : I realize this tech has been available for years and has already been used for some truly awful dystopian stuff around the world, but this story is still jarring and terrifying. How long until most people just don't put any photos of themselves online? https://twitter.com/... Bridget Phetasy / @bridgetphetasy : The dystopian future I've read about my whole life is here and it's only a matter of time before we are all living in corporate archipelagos. https://twitter.com/... Felix Salmon / @felixsalmon : Peter Thiel is a Facebook board member and is also an investor in a company whose entire business model is predicated on violating Facebook's terms of service. https://twitter.com/... @lenubienne : To be completely honest, I can't believe people still believe privacy exists. Hacked photo clouds, funny filter apps, camera doorbells, and just generally posting photos on social media all but ensure that you no longer “own” your own image. https://twitter.com/... Steve Kopack / @stevekopack : “The system — whose backbone is a database of more than three billion images that Clearview claims to have scraped from Facebook, YouTube, Venmo and millions of other websites — goes far beyond anything ever constructed by the United States government or Silicon Valley giants.” https://twitter.com/... Jorge Guajardo / @jorge_guajardo : File under things that would be scandalous if they happened in China, instead of the USA. https://www.nytimes.com/... @saralovesyou : We really do need to have a government that deals with this. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... David Plouffe / @davidplouffe : Let's hope in future debates, candidates are asked about this, AI, changes in warfare, different education models. Much more important than the same old exchange on health care. These are all things that will or are happening and will greatly affect us all. https://twitter.com/... Jameel Jaffer / @jameeljaffer : This is an amazing, scary story from @kashhill. Some of the quotes are absolutely crazy. https://twitter.com/... Jason Schreier / @jasonschreier : Even if you've grown indifferent to privacy concerns these days (or you just assume that tech companies are tracking everything we do no matter what) this is still pretty shocking. Tremendous reporting by @kashhill https://www.nytimes.com/... Matt Blaze / @mattblaze : Terrific reporting by @kashhill. Today this data and tech is used to efficiently identify petty criminals, which means that next week it will be used to identify insurance risks, and the week after to locate stalking targets. Trickle down big brother. https://twitter.com/... Kashmir Hill / @kashhill : @Aaron_Krolik Clearview says 600 law enforcement agencies are using its app. Detectives tell me it's amazing. When the founder took a photo of me while I covered my nose & mouth, it still worked, returning 7 photos of me, one 10 years old. It's insane. Read the story: https://www.nytimes.com/...