California · Wired · Meta · Facebook · Instagram · Wired
Meta Sued Over Teaching Data for Its AI and Face-Recognition Systems
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A set of parents and their children in Illinois and California filed a lawsuit last week in federal court in Chicago alleging that Meta illegally used their Facebook and Instagram photos to build NameTag, an unreleased face-recognition system for its smart glasses, and to train generative AI models including Emu and Muse Image.
Key facts
- Under Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act, the plaintiffs are seeking $5,000 for each intentional or reckless violation, or actual damages if greater, and $1,000 for each negligent violation
- But the proposed class includes people in Illinois, California, and across the United States whose images were uploaded to Facebook or Instagram or were submitted to Meta’s generative AI systems
- The plaintiffs are Francisco Alvarez and his son, both Illinois residents, and Jeremy Wahl, a California resident, and his 10-year-old daughter
- WIRED reported in June that code for NameTag had been secretly embedded in the Meta glasses AI companion app, which had been downloaded more than 50 million times
Summary
The proposed class action alleges that Meta violated Illinois and California privacy laws by extracting biometric information from people’s photos without notice or consent. WIRED reported in June that code for NameTag had been secretly embedded in the Meta glasses AI companion app, which had been downloaded more than 50 million times. The complaint alleges that those faceprints are possibly derived from Facebook and Instagram images, citing reporting that Meta employees claimed that NameTag could recognize people through their Meta connections or public Instagram accounts, along with a company patent describing face matching against profile photos and other images held by Meta.