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Facebook’s Face Recognition Tech Goes on Trial

128 points by aaronyy 10y ago

jeyoor 10y ago
It's good to see that privacy concerns are being voiced publicly. I'm not certain that class-action lawsuits are the most productive approach to take, though. On the technical side, I was intrigued that the "black box" of multilayer neural networks could provide a legal defense for Facebook in this case. Often, the fact that neural networks are harder to analyze compared to other AI techniques is cited as a detriment, but in this legal case it could prove useful.
- iaw 10y ago
  I think because the state law was written about recording the distance between facial features the implementation comes into play. I swear that whole "letter of the law" concept in the US as opposed to the actual intent is frustrating.
  - aisofteng 10y ago
    There's also the concept of the spirit of the law.
    - iaw 10y ago
      That's what I meant, I'll leave the comment as it stands though. Edit: I guess you could say, that was the spirit of my post :D
  - cookiecaper 10y ago
    There are several competing philosophies of legal interpretation, but (afaik) only one, strict constructionism, wholly disregards intent as a principle. Usually, the issue is more about whose intent should be considered, and how should that intent be ascertained, than whether or not "the letter of the law" is supreme. The thing about it is that people are not governed by an ethereal intention that was in the legislature's mind when they crafted the law, because this is undefined and people may have differing opinions about what it is, and because there isn't necessarily a single unifying intention behind the passage of the law; there is only the law that was written, encapsulating the diverse intents of the various parties sufficiently to achieve passage. Assigning more than this enters the realm of speculation. People do not vote their reps in or out based on their intentions, but on their work product (the laws that get passed and enforced). We do not want judges to be able to say "Yes, I know the law says this, but I think the law really meant this thing that is, in fact, very different." That's way too much power for a judge, especially considering they're typically appointed, not elected (local judges are sometimes elected). The power of the people via the legislature can easily be neutralized by such actions, and confidence in the judiciary could be seriously harmed by a string of conflicting and contradictory rulings, making people unsure of what's actually legal/safe. Thus, textualism considers the meaning of the law as written as a whole, and may consult documentation not related to the historical development of the specific legislation at issue, but related to the usage and understanding of words in context at the time that the law was enacted, to approximate what the law (not necessarily the legislature) really meant and how it would've been interpreted by the people who, through their representatives, approved its installation. One could say this is all technical self-indulgence and that it misses the forest for the trees, and that would pretty well encapsulate the legal industry. ;)
- thr0waway1239 10y ago
  >> I'm not certain that class-action lawsuits are the most productive approach to take, though. 1. I don't understand the hand-wringing. If FB turns off the feature for Europe, why are they allowed to continue in the US? [1] 2. It would be better to simply send the decision makers at these tech megacorps "to the guillotine" (figuratively, of course) [2] without over analyzing this issue until they announce a moratorium on these features unless... 3. ... they explicitly ask for permission for each new data point they collect and infer. Sure, opt-in seems high friction in the short run, until these companies finally realize that they are going to be clubbed together with the Enrons and the Arthur Andersons of the world. Character is generally judged at its worst, and having a billion dollars in your back pocket and all the lobbying power in the world, believe it or not, only reinforces suspicion. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/technology/facebook-backs-down-on-face-recognition-in-europe.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/technology/facebook-backs-..., also mentioned in the article. [2] Yes, the guillotine was a knee jerk reaction too. The problem is - these preachy founders seem to strongly believe they are entitled to apply rules differently to themselves. E.g. Mark Z buying off all the four houses surrounding his house, Eric Schmidt getting angry when Google was used to obtain his personal stuff..
artursapek 10y ago
> “We could soon have security cameras in stores that identify people as they shop,” I stopped using Facebook 5 years ago because I noticed using it made me unhappy. I continue to not go back because of privacy concerns like this.
- dagenleg 10y ago
  Oh, don't worry, just because you are not interested in Facebook, doesn't meant it's not interested in you.
- chipperyman573 10y ago
  Facebook has what they call "shadow profiles" that still track you even if you've never signed up (or deleted your account). Not using Facebook doesn't mean they don't have information on you.
  - curiousDog 10y ago
    Do you have a source for this? Also, I think it would be considered spying. Facebook, the NSA of the corporate world. I closed my account 5 yrs ago as well.
    - ubernostrum 10y ago
      Many sites do this. They encourage users to give full access to their phone's contact list, and store all the data they get from it, then start building a network of "people who know this email address/phone number", ostensibly so that when they finally convince someone to sign up they have a ready-made network of recommended "people you may already know".
    - chipperyman573 10y ago
      http://www.zdnet.com/article/anger-mounts-after-facebooks-shadow-profiles-leak-in-bug/ http://www.zdnet.com/article/anger-mounts-after-facebooks-sh...
  - artursapek 10y ago
goombastic 10y ago
This means I'll be recognized even if I appear in photographs taken by others in public places and I dont even use FB. This is unsettling.
gooseus 10y ago
How soon before this analysis is being used to cross-reference with terrorist and sexual predator watch-lists causing all sorts of problems for people who happen to closely resemble anyone on those lists? I'm thinking it's time to buy stock in suppliers of masks, cosmetic surgery and other forms of facial obfuscation.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- petre 10y ago
  There are already make-up patterns that obfuscate the face causing face detection tofail, but no one wears that on a daily basis, because it looks rather weird.
e324809234 10y ago
As someone who had cosmetic surgery, it took a good amount of changes to be tagged as a "different" person by Facebook and the Photos app. One operation that altered the frontal view of the jaw seemed to have finally done the trick (many common operations like rhinoplasty mostly affect your side profile.)
- djloche 10y ago
  Facebook doesn't properly identify me vs my brother, so they still have some things to work one.
  - jedberg 10y ago
    Are you twins or just "regular" siblings?
    - djloche 10y ago
      He's 2 years older than me. I think part of this is that their facial recognition doesn't have a logic check based on the other context data that they have. eg. my brother's wife will post vacation photos of him, him with his kids, and him with her, and yet sometimes it still auto-identifies the pictures of him as me. Facebook knows I'm logged in at an ip 1000 miles away. Facebook knows my brother is with his wife because they both have logged in recently while on vacation. Yet I am tagged instead of him.
      - kakaorka 10y ago
        I think they only try to recognize the face and don't really care about anything more than that and because it's actually very accurate, that strategy has been working so far.
TheBeardKing 10y ago
From the article it sounds like the result of the lawsuit may be just that facebook adds a disclaimer to their ToS that you accept them using your biometric data by using their service. No surprise there, if you don't want any service collecting any of your data, don't use their service.
- devoply 10y ago
  I would like FB declared a monopoly and broken up or have some sort of data sharing forced on them so that other social networks can pop up. Network effects cause monopolies. There should be regulation to undo the effects of this sort of monopoly to increase competition in this space. Namely by forced open api and data sharing, so you can take your data to another network if you want to.
- grasshopper12a 10y ago
  Another to see that is that things are not black or white. It's not the company on one side dictating what it wants to the user. This is an example of someone saying "I don't agree with that" and took action. People taking action in accordance to their beliefs should be celebrated.
- dsp1234 10y ago
  No surprise there, if you don't want any service collecting any of your data, don't use their service. Unfortunately, that doesn't go far enough. I don't use FB, but that doesn't mean it doesn't collect my data. It does because my husband and friends use FB, and I do not control the information they share about me with FB. Currently it has to be, "if you don't want any service collecting any of your data, don't use their service, and don't interact with other people or companies who use their service.". As an example of where your original statement fails, I don't want to be tracked in the mall by companies tracking my phone.
  - wvenable 10y ago
    But your husband and friends are at fault for sharing your information, not FB. Take Facebook out of the equation and you still have friends showing your picture around, perhaps to people you don't want them to. In a Facebookless world, you would simply tell them to stop. My point is that it isn't Facebook's fault that your friends share too much about you.
ljk 10y ago
> Therein lies the irony: If Facebook doesn’t save faces in its database, it may save face in court. is this irony? isn't it just a pun?
rb808 10y ago
It freaked me out in the recent video about tech in Russia. You could take a picture of someone with your phone and it'll find them in social networks. Eg you could take a picture of someone on a street them find everything about them. You can't stop progress. See 30 minutes in. https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-hello-world-russia/ https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-hello-world-russia/ https://findface.ru/ https://findface.ru/
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
traviswingo 10y ago
This seems ridiculous to me. That being said, Facebook can't just allow users to opt out of biometric data stores?
- yellow_postit 10y ago
  They would likely require people to upload multiple photos to build a profile to "opt-out" and even then there are FPs and look-a-likes that make such an opt-out hard to guarantee (e.g. identical twin where one opts-in and one opts-out)
benjismith 10y ago
To me, the interesting thing about this is that the "biometric data" is actually the collection of photos that the users uploaded. The data-structures used for facial recognition are just metadata, extracted from the original imagery. It seems to me like data retention laws would apply to the original imagery, but not the derivative data structures. But that's obviously not what privacy-conscious user would expect... I'm interested in seeing how this kind of case ends up being decided, when it (inevitably) ends up at the supreme court.
- amelius 10y ago
  > It seems to me like data retention laws would apply to the original imagery, but not the derivative data structures. That's probably not how it works. If I have a database of personal information of users, and I throw away the user's day of birth (but not birth year), I have still a database with sensitive information. Also, if I convert a CD to MP3 format, then I'll also throw away 90% of the original information. I might still be liable for illegally copying a song. (IANAL)
cinquemb 10y ago
Facebook et al are only paving the way for the future where more and more people and smaller organizations will have such tools and data at their disposal for whatever means. These walled gardens of data can only maintain this advantage for so long.
Keverw 10y ago
I like the face feature personally. Kinda just neat and makes tagging super easy. However I'm curious, How does Illinois even have jurisdiction to sue Facebook? As far as I know they don't have any land or employees there being a California based company. Even many terms of services say you agree which court to dispute. Seems like Illinois is over reaching to me. https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms > You will resolve any claim, cause of action or dispute (claim) you have with us arising out of or relating to this Statement or Facebook exclusively in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California or a state court located in San Mateo County, and you agree to submit to the personal jurisdiction of such courts for the purpose of litigating all such claims. The laws of the State of California will govern this Statement, as well as any claim that might arise between you and us, without regard to conflict of law provisions.
- stablemap 10y ago
  They have an office in downtown Chicago. Sales and marketing, I think.
  - Keverw 10y ago
    Yep - just did a Google search and landed on this. https://www.facebook.com/careers/search/?q=&location=chicago https://www.facebook.com/careers/search/?q=&location=chicago So I guess that's how they can get them... I really hope Facebook wins though. Last time I checked Face recognition creates 3 floats from a face. I'm not sure Facebook's specifics but in general that how it works. So in a way I'm amazed a face can be turned into 3 numbers, and also think it's silly to sue over 3 numbers in the grand scheme of things.
mikebay 10y ago
I would not use any Facebook's technology for anything. Enough with CIA and NSA seriously!
crumpled 10y ago
Suppose facebook has the ability to look at a photo and determine who is in the photo, and the court determines that amounts to storing biometric data (despite the explicit exclusion of photos from the definition of biometric data). Now facebook would have to get explicit permission from users and non-users to collect biometric data. How could they possibly not collect data from non-users? If they have the ability to turn the feature on at any moment, any photo of a person would amount to biometric data, whether the person was a user or not. There doesn't seem to be a good way to comply. They could not host photos (no way). They could stop pursuing facial recognition (yeah right). My favorite solution is to have them alter any new upload by blurring out the faces of any person who hasn't consented to them storing biometrics.

128 points by aaronyy 10y ago

It's good to see that privacy concerns are being voiced publicly. I'm not certain that class-action lawsuits are the most productive approach to take, though. On the technical side, I was intrigued that the "black box" of multilayer neural networks could provide a legal defense for Facebook in this case. Often, the fact that neural networks are harder to analyze compared to other AI techniques is cited as a detriment, but in this legal case it could prove useful.

iaw 10y ago
I think because the state law was written about recording the distance between facial features the implementation comes into play. I swear that whole "letter of the law" concept in the US as opposed to the actual intent is frustrating.
- aisofteng 10y ago
  There's also the concept of the spirit of the law.
  - iaw 10y ago
    That's what I meant, I'll leave the comment as it stands though. Edit: I guess you could say, that was the spirit of my post :D
- cookiecaper 10y ago
  There are several competing philosophies of legal interpretation, but (afaik) only one, strict constructionism, wholly disregards intent as a principle. Usually, the issue is more about whose intent should be considered, and how should that intent be ascertained, than whether or not "the letter of the law" is supreme. The thing about it is that people are not governed by an ethereal intention that was in the legislature's mind when they crafted the law, because this is undefined and people may have differing opinions about what it is, and because there isn't necessarily a single unifying intention behind the passage of the law; there is only the law that was written, encapsulating the diverse intents of the various parties sufficiently to achieve passage. Assigning more than this enters the realm of speculation. People do not vote their reps in or out based on their intentions, but on their work product (the laws that get passed and enforced). We do not want judges to be able to say "Yes, I know the law says this, but I think the law really meant this thing that is, in fact, very different." That's way too much power for a judge, especially considering they're typically appointed, not elected (local judges are sometimes elected). The power of the people via the legislature can easily be neutralized by such actions, and confidence in the judiciary could be seriously harmed by a string of conflicting and contradictory rulings, making people unsure of what's actually legal/safe. Thus, textualism considers the meaning of the law as written as a whole, and may consult documentation not related to the historical development of the specific legislation at issue, but related to the usage and understanding of words in context at the time that the law was enacted, to approximate what the law (not necessarily the legislature) really meant and how it would've been interpreted by the people who, through their representatives, approved its installation. One could say this is all technical self-indulgence and that it misses the forest for the trees, and that would pretty well encapsulate the legal industry. ;)
thr0waway1239 10y ago
>> I'm not certain that class-action lawsuits are the most productive approach to take, though. 1. I don't understand the hand-wringing. If FB turns off the feature for Europe, why are they allowed to continue in the US? [1] 2. It would be better to simply send the decision makers at these tech megacorps "to the guillotine" (figuratively, of course) [2] without over analyzing this issue until they announce a moratorium on these features unless... 3. ... they explicitly ask for permission for each new data point they collect and infer. Sure, opt-in seems high friction in the short run, until these companies finally realize that they are going to be clubbed together with the Enrons and the Arthur Andersons of the world. Character is generally judged at its worst, and having a billion dollars in your back pocket and all the lobbying power in the world, believe it or not, only reinforces suspicion. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/technology/facebook-backs-down-on-face-recognition-in-europe.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/technology/facebook-backs-..., also mentioned in the article. [2] Yes, the guillotine was a knee jerk reaction too. The problem is - these preachy founders seem to strongly believe they are entitled to apply rules differently to themselves. E.g. Mark Z buying off all the four houses surrounding his house, Eric Schmidt getting angry when Google was used to obtain his personal stuff..

artursapek 10y ago

> “We could soon have security cameras in stores that identify people as they shop,” I stopped using Facebook 5 years ago because I noticed using it made me unhappy. I continue to not go back because of privacy concerns like this.

dagenleg 10y ago
Oh, don't worry, just because you are not interested in Facebook, doesn't meant it's not interested in you.
chipperyman573 10y ago
Facebook has what they call "shadow profiles" that still track you even if you've never signed up (or deleted your account). Not using Facebook doesn't mean they don't have information on you.
- curiousDog 10y ago
  Do you have a source for this? Also, I think it would be considered spying. Facebook, the NSA of the corporate world. I closed my account 5 yrs ago as well.
  - ubernostrum 10y ago
    Many sites do this. They encourage users to give full access to their phone's contact list, and store all the data they get from it, then start building a network of "people who know this email address/phone number", ostensibly so that when they finally convince someone to sign up they have a ready-made network of recommended "people you may already know".
  - chipperyman573 10y ago
    http://www.zdnet.com/article/anger-mounts-after-facebooks-shadow-profiles-leak-in-bug/ http://www.zdnet.com/article/anger-mounts-after-facebooks-sh...
- artursapek 10y ago

goombastic 10y ago

This means I'll be recognized even if I appear in photographs taken by others in public places and I dont even use FB. This is unsettling.

gooseus 10y ago

How soon before this analysis is being used to cross-reference with terrorist and sexual predator watch-lists causing all sorts of problems for people who happen to closely resemble anyone on those lists? I'm thinking it's time to buy stock in suppliers of masks, cosmetic surgery and other forms of facial obfuscation.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
petre 10y ago
There are already make-up patterns that obfuscate the face causing face detection tofail, but no one wears that on a daily basis, because it looks rather weird.

e324809234 10y ago

As someone who had cosmetic surgery, it took a good amount of changes to be tagged as a "different" person by Facebook and the Photos app. One operation that altered the frontal view of the jaw seemed to have finally done the trick (many common operations like rhinoplasty mostly affect your side profile.)

djloche 10y ago
Facebook doesn't properly identify me vs my brother, so they still have some things to work one.
- jedberg 10y ago
  Are you twins or just "regular" siblings?
  - djloche 10y ago
    He's 2 years older than me. I think part of this is that their facial recognition doesn't have a logic check based on the other context data that they have. eg. my brother's wife will post vacation photos of him, him with his kids, and him with her, and yet sometimes it still auto-identifies the pictures of him as me. Facebook knows I'm logged in at an ip 1000 miles away. Facebook knows my brother is with his wife because they both have logged in recently while on vacation. Yet I am tagged instead of him.
    - kakaorka 10y ago
      I think they only try to recognize the face and don't really care about anything more than that and because it's actually very accurate, that strategy has been working so far.

TheBeardKing 10y ago

From the article it sounds like the result of the lawsuit may be just that facebook adds a disclaimer to their ToS that you accept them using your biometric data by using their service. No surprise there, if you don't want any service collecting any of your data, don't use their service.

devoply 10y ago
I would like FB declared a monopoly and broken up or have some sort of data sharing forced on them so that other social networks can pop up. Network effects cause monopolies. There should be regulation to undo the effects of this sort of monopoly to increase competition in this space. Namely by forced open api and data sharing, so you can take your data to another network if you want to.
grasshopper12a 10y ago
Another to see that is that things are not black or white. It's not the company on one side dictating what it wants to the user. This is an example of someone saying "I don't agree with that" and took action. People taking action in accordance to their beliefs should be celebrated.
dsp1234 10y ago
No surprise there, if you don't want any service collecting any of your data, don't use their service. Unfortunately, that doesn't go far enough. I don't use FB, but that doesn't mean it doesn't collect my data. It does because my husband and friends use FB, and I do not control the information they share about me with FB. Currently it has to be, "if you don't want any service collecting any of your data, don't use their service, and don't interact with other people or companies who use their service.". As an example of where your original statement fails, I don't want to be tracked in the mall by companies tracking my phone.
- wvenable 10y ago
  But your husband and friends are at fault for sharing your information, not FB. Take Facebook out of the equation and you still have friends showing your picture around, perhaps to people you don't want them to. In a Facebookless world, you would simply tell them to stop. My point is that it isn't Facebook's fault that your friends share too much about you.

ljk 10y ago

> Therein lies the irony: If Facebook doesn’t save faces in its database, it may save face in court. is this irony? isn't it just a pun?

rb808 10y ago

It freaked me out in the recent video about tech in Russia. You could take a picture of someone with your phone and it'll find them in social networks. Eg you could take a picture of someone on a street them find everything about them. You can't stop progress. See 30 minutes in. https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-hello-world-russia/ https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-hello-world-russia/ https://findface.ru/ https://findface.ru/

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

traviswingo 10y ago

This seems ridiculous to me. That being said, Facebook can't just allow users to opt out of biometric data stores?

yellow_postit 10y ago
They would likely require people to upload multiple photos to build a profile to "opt-out" and even then there are FPs and look-a-likes that make such an opt-out hard to guarantee (e.g. identical twin where one opts-in and one opts-out)

benjismith 10y ago

To me, the interesting thing about this is that the "biometric data" is actually the collection of photos that the users uploaded. The data-structures used for facial recognition are just metadata, extracted from the original imagery. It seems to me like data retention laws would apply to the original imagery, but not the derivative data structures. But that's obviously not what privacy-conscious user would expect... I'm interested in seeing how this kind of case ends up being decided, when it (inevitably) ends up at the supreme court.

amelius 10y ago
> It seems to me like data retention laws would apply to the original imagery, but not the derivative data structures. That's probably not how it works. If I have a database of personal information of users, and I throw away the user's day of birth (but not birth year), I have still a database with sensitive information. Also, if I convert a CD to MP3 format, then I'll also throw away 90% of the original information. I might still be liable for illegally copying a song. (IANAL)

cinquemb 10y ago

Facebook et al are only paving the way for the future where more and more people and smaller organizations will have such tools and data at their disposal for whatever means. These walled gardens of data can only maintain this advantage for so long.

Keverw 10y ago

I like the face feature personally. Kinda just neat and makes tagging super easy. However I'm curious, How does Illinois even have jurisdiction to sue Facebook? As far as I know they don't have any land or employees there being a California based company. Even many terms of services say you agree which court to dispute. Seems like Illinois is over reaching to me. https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms > You will resolve any claim, cause of action or dispute (claim) you have with us arising out of or relating to this Statement or Facebook exclusively in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California or a state court located in San Mateo County, and you agree to submit to the personal jurisdiction of such courts for the purpose of litigating all such claims. The laws of the State of California will govern this Statement, as well as any claim that might arise between you and us, without regard to conflict of law provisions.

stablemap 10y ago
They have an office in downtown Chicago. Sales and marketing, I think.
- Keverw 10y ago
  Yep - just did a Google search and landed on this. https://www.facebook.com/careers/search/?q=&location=chicago https://www.facebook.com/careers/search/?q=&location=chicago So I guess that's how they can get them... I really hope Facebook wins though. Last time I checked Face recognition creates 3 floats from a face. I'm not sure Facebook's specifics but in general that how it works. So in a way I'm amazed a face can be turned into 3 numbers, and also think it's silly to sue over 3 numbers in the grand scheme of things.

mikebay 10y ago

I would not use any Facebook's technology for anything. Enough with CIA and NSA seriously!

crumpled 10y ago

Suppose facebook has the ability to look at a photo and determine who is in the photo, and the court determines that amounts to storing biometric data (despite the explicit exclusion of photos from the definition of biometric data). Now facebook would have to get explicit permission from users and non-users to collect biometric data. How could they possibly not collect data from non-users? If they have the ability to turn the feature on at any moment, any photo of a person would amount to biometric data, whether the person was a user or not. There doesn't seem to be a good way to comply. They could not host photos (no way). They could stop pursuing facial recognition (yeah right). My favorite solution is to have them alter any new upload by blurring out the faces of any person who hasn't consented to them storing biometrics.