Facebook Ditches Facial Recognition and Will Delete Billion Users’ Data

Facebook abandons facial recognition
Written by Emma Davis

Facebook announced that it is ditching the Face Recognition system on its platform and will remove the corresponding profiles previously created for a billion people.

Face Recognition analyzed the photos taken by tagged users and the profile photos of associated users to create a unique template. This template was then used to identify users in other uploaded photos, as well as automatic tags in Memories.

Now, a week after its rebranding to Meta, Facebook has announced that it is ditching the facial recognition feature and will remove the templates generated by the system.

Last week, the social network announced the rebranding of its parent company, which will henceforth be called Meta. This title is inspired by Neil Stevenson’s novel Avalanche, where the Metaverse is a virtual reality that encompasses the entire world.

The name change comes amid a recent leak of internal Facebook documents that highlighted its many ethical concerns. In particular, it turned out that the company was aware of the consequences of using its platform, including the spread of radicalizing misinformation, as well as negative consequences for the mental health of adolescent users.

Mark Zuckerberg said the company is ready to change and will redouble its efforts to create immersive virtual experiences in the future.

The many specific cases where face recognition can be useful need to be weighed against growing concerns about the use of this technology in general. There are many concerns about where facial recognition technology should be in society, and regulators are still in the process of developing a clear set of rules governing its use. In the face of continuing uncertainty, we believe it is advisable to limit the use of facial recognition to a narrow set of use cases.Jerome Pesenti writes, the company's vice president of artificial intelligence.
Jerome Pesenti

Jerome Pesenti

The fact is that Facebook has already faced the legal consequences of such “fears”. For example, the company recently paid $ 650 million due to a class action lawsuit in the state of Illinois, where it was alleged that the social network collected and stored biometric data of users without their consent.

Privacy advocates and cybersecurity researchers are already praising Facebook for abandoning facial recognition.

Facebook has announced they will be deleting over a billion face recognition templates as they shut down their entire face recognition system. This is great news for Facebook users, and for the global movement pushing back on this technology.EFF writes.

Let me remind you that we also wrote that Have I Been Pwned included a search for data leaked from Facebook by phone number.

Sending
User Review
0 (0 votes)
Comments Rating 0 (0 reviews)

About the author

Emma Davis

I'm writer and content manager (a short time ago completed a bachelor degree in Marketing from the Gustavus Adolphus College). For now, I have a deep drive to study cyber security.

Leave a Reply

Sending