The facial recognition system relies on scraping the data of people from across the web without their explicit consent, a practice which has naturally raised some eyebrows—including the ACLU’s which called it a “nightmare scenario” for privacy.

Around three billion images are said to have been scraped for Clearview AI’s system.

“Common law has never recognised a right to privacy for your face,” Clearview AI lawyer Tor Ekeland once argued.

Whether you call them protestors or domestic terrorists, the Trump supporters who raided the US Capitol Building last week – incited by the president to halt democracy and overturn the votes of millions of Americans – committed clear criminal offences that were bipartisanly condemned.

In comments to New York Times, Clearview AI CEO Hoan Ton-That claimed the company’s witnesses “a 26 percent increase of searches over our usual weekday search volume” on January 7th, following the riots.

Given the number of individuals involved, law enforcement has a gargantuan task to identify and locate the people that went far beyond exercising their right to peaceful protest and invaded a federal building, caused huge amounts of damage, and threatened elected representatives and staff.

The FBI has issued public appeals, but it’s little surprise that law enforcement is turning to automated means—regardless of the controversy. According to Clearview AI, approximately 2,400 agencies across the US use the company’s facial recognition technology.

Last year, the UK and Australia launched a joint probe into Clearview AI’s practices.

“The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) and the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) have opened a joint investigation into the personal information handling practices of Clearview Inc., focusing on the company’s use of ‘scraped’ data and biometrics of individuals,” the ICO wrote in a statement.

A similar probe was also launched by the EU’s privacy watchdog. The European Data Protection Board ruled that any use of the service by law enforcement in Europe would “likely not be consistent with the EU data protection regime” and that it “has doubts as to whether any Union or Member State law provides a legal basis for using a service such as the one offered by Clearview AI.”

Clearview AI has already been forced to suspend operations in Canada after the federal Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada opened an investigation into the company.

While Clearview AI’s facial recognition tech continues to have widespread use in the US, some police departments have taken the independent decision to ban officers from using such systems due to the well-documented inaccuracies which particularly affect minority communities.

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Clearview AI has repeatedly made headlines, and rarely for good reason. The company’s facial recognition technology is impressive but relies on scraping billions of people’s data from across the web.

“Common law has never recognised a right to privacy for your face,” Clearview AI lawyer Tor Ekeland argued recently.

Regulators in the UK and Australia seem to have a different perspective than Ekeland and have announced a joint probe into Clearview AI’s practices.

“The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) and the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) have opened a joint investigation into the personal information handling practices of Clearview Inc., focusing on the company’s use of ‘scraped’ data and biometrics of individuals,” the ICO wrote in a statement.

“The investigation highlights the importance of enforcement cooperation in protecting the personal information of Australian and UK citizens in a globalized data environment.”

A similar probe was launched by the EU’s privacy watchdog last month.

The European Data Protection Board ruled that any use of the service by law enforcement in Europe would “likely not be consistent with the EU data protection regime” and that it “has doubts as to whether any Union or Member State law provides a legal basis for using a service such as the one offered by Clearview AI.”

Clearview AI’s facial recognition system is used by over 2,200 law enforcement agencies around the world. A recent leak suggests it’s even being used by commercial businesses like Best Buy and Macy’s. In May, Clearview said it would stop working with non–law enforcement entities.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) launched a lawsuit against Clearview AI in May after calling it a “nightmare scenario” for privacy.

Aside from the company’s practices, concerns have been raised about Clearview AI’s extensive ties with the far-right. Ekeland himself has gained notoriety as “The Troll’s Lawyer” for defending clients such as neo-Nazi troll Andrew Auernheimer.

“Companies like Clearview will end privacy as we know it, and must be stopped,” said Nathan Freed Wessler, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project.

(Photo by The Creative Exchange on Unsplash)

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Clearview AI’s facial recognition system is used by over 2,200 law enforcement agencies around the world and even commercial businesses like Best Buy and Macy’s, according to a recent leak.

The EDPB has now ruled that any use of the service by law enforcement in Europe would “likely not be consistent with the EU data protection regime.”

Furthermore, the watchdog “has doubts as to whether any Union or Member State law provides a legal basis for using a service such as the one offered by Clearview AI.”

Clearview AI scrapes billions of photos from across the internet for its powerful system, a practice which has come under fire by privacy campaigners. “Common law has never recognised a right to privacy for your face,” Clearview AI lawyer Tor Ekeland argued recently.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) launched a lawsuit against Clearview AI last month after calling it a “nightmare scenario” for privacy.

“Companies like Clearview will end privacy as we know it, and must be stopped,” said Nathan Freed Wessler, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project.

Aside from the company’s practices, concerns have been raised about Clearview AI’s extensive ties with the far-right. Ekeland himself has gained notoriety as “The Troll’s Lawyer” for defending clients such as neo-Nazi troll Andrew Auernheimer.

Backlash over Clearview AI forced the company to announce it will no longer offer its services to private companies. The EU’s ruling will limit Clearview AI’s potential customers even further.

Concerns have grown in recent weeks about facial recognition services amid protests over racial discrimination. Facial recognition services have been repeatedly found to falsely flag minorities; stoking fears they’ll lead to automated racial profiling.

IBM and Amazon have both announced this week they’ll no longer provide facial recognition services to law enforcement and have called on Congress to increase regulation to help ensure future deployments meet ethical standards.

(Photo by Christian Lue on Unsplash)

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“Companies like Clearview will end privacy as we know it, and must be stopped,” said Nathan Freed Wessler, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project.

“The ACLU is taking its fight to defend privacy rights against the growing threat of this unregulated surveillance technology to the courts, even as we double down on our work in legislatures and city councils nationwide.”

Clearview AI has repeatedly come under fire due to its practice of scraping billions of photos from across the internet and storing them in a database for powerful facial recognition services.

“Common law has never recognised a right to privacy for your face,” Clearview AI lawyer Tor Ekeland said recently.

The company’s facial recognition system is used by over 2,200 law enforcement agencies around the world – and even commercial businesses like Best Buy and Macy’s, according to a recent leak.

In a press release, the ACLU wrote:

“The New York Times revealed the company was secretly capturing untold numbers of biometric identifiers for purposes of surveillance and tracking, without notice to the individuals affected.

The company’s actions embodied the nightmare scenario privacy advocates long warned of, and accomplished what many companies — such as Google — refused to try due to ethical concerns.”

However, even more concerning is Clearview AI’s extensive ties with the far-right.

Clearview AI founder Hoan Ton-That claims to have since disassociated from far-right views, movements, and individuals. Ekeland, meanwhile, has gained notoriety as “The Troll’s Lawyer” for defending clients such as neo-Nazi troll Andrew Auernheimer.

The ACLU says its lawsuit represents the first “to force any face recognition surveillance company to answer directly to groups representing survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault, undocumented immigrants, and other vulnerable communities uniquely harmed by face recognition surveillance.”

Facial recognition technologies have become a key focus for the ACLU.

Back in March, AI News reported the ACLU was suing the US government for blocking a probe into the use of facial recognition technology at airports. In 2018, the union caught our attention for highlighting the inaccuracy of Amazon’s facial recognition algorithm – especially when identifying people of colour and females.

“Clearview’s actions represent one of the largest threats to personal privacy by a private company our country has faced,” said Jay Edelson of Edelson PC, lead counsel handling this case on a pro bono basis.

“If a well-funded, politically connected company can simply amass information to track all of us, we are living in a different America.”

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Clearview AI has come under scrutiny for scraping billions of photos from across the internet and storing them in a database for powerful facial recognition services. Privacy activists criticise the practice as the people in those images never gave their consent.

“Common law has never recognised a right to privacy for your face,” Clearview AI lawyer Tor Ekeland said recently. “It’s kind of a bizarre argument to make because [your face is the] most public thing out there.”

The company’s facial recognition system is used by over 600 law enforcement agencies. Furthermore, a recent leak revealed its client list also includes commercial businesses like Best Buy and Macy’s.

As if the company’s system wasn’t dystopian enough, an extensive investigation by The Huffington Post has revealed extensive links to some rather unsavoury people and movements.

Clearview AI founder Hoan Ton-That reportedly attended a 2016 dinner with white supremacist Richard Spencer that was organised by Jeff Giesea, a financier of the “alt-right” and associate of Palantir founder Peter Thiel.

Ton-That was also part of a Slack channel run by far-right activist Chuck Johnson, known for running crowdfunding platform WeSearchr that was predominately used by white supremacists. The Slack channel also included the webmaster of neo-Nazi website Daily Stormer, conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich, and self-avowed “internet troll” Andrew Auernheimer (Auernheimer was among the first clients of Clearview AI lawyer Ekeland).

In January 2017, Chuck Johnson bragged on Facebook that he was “building algorithms to ID all the illegal immigrants for the deportation squads.” A source for Huffington Post said they’d seen Johnson discussing that project with a “bunch of really important people” at Trump’s hotel in DC and introducing them to a man that was likely Ton-That.

According to ex-Breitbart editor and former alt-right member Katie McHugh, Johnson asked to be put in touch with Trump advisor Stephen Miller to pitch a “way to identify every illegal alien in the country.”

Back when Clearview AI was known as Smartcheckr, the firm contracted Douglass Mackey who pitched the company’s technology to anti-Semitic congressional candidate Paul Nehlen for extreme campaign opposition research. Mackey was later found to be the overseer of a racist propaganda operation under the pseudonym of Ricky Vaughn. Ton-That told Huffington Post that Mackey was only contracted for three weeks and wasn’t authorised to make the offer to Nehlen.

An employee of Clearview AI, Marko Jukic, marketed the company’s technology to police departments. Jukic “published many thousands of extremist words on neoreactionary blogs,” according to Huffington Post.

Jukic’s publishings advocated the segregation of Jews, the “generous use” of racial profiling, using military force to “pacify” the “ghettos,” normalising the use of racist terminology, the replacement of democracy with authoritarianism, the assassination of journalists, and praising the ethnonationalism of Putin’s Russia while musing the collapse of the US because of “America’s diversity problem”.

As the founder of Clearview AI, Ton-That claims to have disassociated from far-right views, movements, and individuals. He told Huffington Post that growing up on the internet did not “serve him well” and “there was a period when I explored a range of ideas—not out of belief in any of them, but out of a desire to search for self and place in the world. I have finally found it, and the mission to help make America a safer place.”

You can read Huffington Post’s full investigation into Clearview AI’s far-right links here.

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