4 ms·

Unfortunately I suspect this is somewhat of a Pandora's box situation. There's only so much legislation can do once this technology becomes commonplace. Even in

Unfortunately I suspect this is somewhat of a Pandora's box situation. There's only so much legislation can do once this technology becomes commonplace. Even in a hypothetical extreme scenario where facial recognition technology were completely banned the software would still exist and there'd still be databases of people's faces floating around the web. All legislation would do is create a situation where it's "illegal" to use software to identify people from a picture of their face even though just about everybody knows how to do so trivially and secretly.

dimitrios1 6y ago
Harsh penalty and strict enforcement should do quite well. If you want to be a database of private information, the burden is on you to comply with privacy laws. If I assert you have collected my face and stored it illegally in a database (i.e. without my consent), a regulator should be able to quickly follow up for compliance, and if found to be out of compliance, penalty is imposed. TCPA works really well for call centers, and CAN-SPAM works really well for email marketing platforms. There's no reason a similar piece of legislation for facial recognition could not be passed.
- Ajedi32 6y ago
  Sure, you can stop legitimate US companies from using your face that way. But what happens when the database isn't hosted in the US, or is distributed anonymously by a peer-to-peer network. TCPA and CAN-SPAM are hardly what I'd call effective. I still get tons of spam calls and emails. I'm not saying legislation is a bad idea; just that it's not going to be able to put the genie back in the bottle.
  - michaelt 6y ago
    Unlike spam (which can trivially be sent across jurisdictional borders) you can't point a new camera at a San Francisco resident without being in California.
    - da_big_ghey 6y ago
      Stream camera to box in other nation running recongiton model.
  - dimitrios1 6y ago
    Sure, there are going to be smaller players, but they won't matter in the grand scheme of things. The FBI, or DOD isn't going to go scouring the crevices of the web and look through various sources, they want one big database that's easy to query, and likewise, a company like Clearwater wants to get big so it can be in a position of power, and of course, $$$.
    - salawat 6y ago
      You severely underestimate the lengths government will go to to end run around prohibitions, and how easily that can be accomplished by a private contractor.
      - dimitrios1 6y ago
        No, not really. I've considered that as well. It's ok if the government does it, there is oversight committees, there's the whole issue of the constitution, and eventually all will be known. Plus things can change. The PATRIOT act could very well be overturned one day. I am not saying shady actors won't get away with some shady stuff for a short while. I care more about private side business being allowed to do this unbounded.
  - jacques_chester 6y ago
    You can also stop legitimate murderers from murdering by enforcing laws against murder. "It's hard" is not an answer to the question "should this be illegal?". It's a statement that comes later, when the budgets are being made.
whatshisface 6y ago
What if we gave people copyright over their likenesses? In fact, celebrities already have ownership of their likenesses. I can't sell Leonard Nimoy lunchboxes, for example. Clearview shouldn't be able to sell pictures of me either. If they want to sell my pictures, they should get in touch with me, and we can work out a licensing agreement. https://collectingtrek.ca/2019/02/03/leonard-nimoy-sued-paramount-and-won/ https://collectingtrek.ca/2019/02/03/leonard-nimoy-sued-para...
- kadonoishi 6y ago
  everybody has an NFT on their likenesses
- salawat 6y ago
  Then whose copyright takes pecedence, you, or your photographer? If you leave it up to contract law to answer it, we'll be in the same spot we're in now with a new template clause no one will ever read. Plus, it doesn't solve the more pressing fundamental issue of Third Party Doctrine giving government an end run around any prohibition of amassing such a system by hiring out the deed to someone unencumbered.
  - whatshisface 6y ago
    Yours, because the copyright of a photocopy of a book remains with the author. No, because I don't have any legal relationship with street camera operators. This would not be a panacea for all privacy issues, it would specifically solve ones related to zero-touch trackers. No, because neither the government nor unencumbered entities can profit by selling works that I own the copyright to, nor can they profit from selling derived works.
CaptArmchair 6y ago
I only partially agree with that assertion. Regulating and restricting the use of facial recognition technology is entails creating civil and criminal liabilities. Such liabilities would make it prohibitively expensive for private initiatives to develop facial recognition products and services. Such legislation doesn't have to target facial recognition tech directly. In many jurisdictions, existing privacy legislation already puts up barriers. And legal cases involving Clearview are testing these frameworks. For instance, last year, privacy protection authorities in Canada launched a probe into Clearview and how it holds up legally (february 2020). Clearview subsequently shuttered it's operations in Canda (august 2020). https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/nr-c_200706/ https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/n... https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/an_200221/ https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/a... In Europe, there's the GDPR. Last year, Clearview was hit by a complaint in France. And just last month, february 2021, Hamburg Data Protection Authority ruled that Clearview clearly breaches the GDPR. https://www.businessinsider.com/clearview-ai-gdpr-complaint-jumbo-privacy-2020-7 https://www.businessinsider.com/clearview-ai-gdpr-complaint-... https://edri.org/our-work/reclaiming-your-face-from-clearview-ai/ https://edri.org/our-work/reclaiming-your-face-from-clearvie... https://noyb.eu/en/clearview-ai-deemed-illegal-eu https://noyb.eu/en/clearview-ai-deemed-illegal-eu For sure, legislation and enforcement don't root technology once it's out there. But that's not the point. If you live in a place where you don't have strong privacy rights, you, as an individual citizen, don't have any legal footing to begin with to stop anyone from appropriating your portrait and using that in ways you don't agree with.
ARandomerDude 6y ago
Think about this phrase but replace it with other crimes: > All legislation would do is create a situation where it's "illegal" to [commit some crime] even though just about everybody knows how to do so trivially and secretly. The list of crimes that fit that description is huge: - rob a convenience store - molest a child - commit insurance fraud - make a pipe bomb - ... We still outlaw those things, even though most people already know how to do them (or could figure it out quickly) because we don't want people doing them routinely and we're willing to force people to stop.
- Nextgrid 6y ago
  All of these things have negative externalities that are hard to conceal (except maybe the last one - if you never use your creation you'll be fine and the law is unlikely to catch up with you). The problem with facial recognition software is that it's very easy to conceal its usage. Businesses can use it secretly and then use parallel construction (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction) to explain how they obtained the information that actually originated from facial recognition.

dimitrios1 6y ago

Harsh penalty and strict enforcement should do quite well. If you want to be a database of private information, the burden is on you to comply with privacy laws. If I assert you have collected my face and stored it illegally in a database (i.e. without my consent), a regulator should be able to quickly follow up for compliance, and if found to be out of compliance, penalty is imposed. TCPA works really well for call centers, and CAN-SPAM works really well for email marketing platforms. There's no reason a similar piece of legislation for facial recognition could not be passed.

Ajedi32 6y ago
Sure, you can stop legitimate US companies from using your face that way. But what happens when the database isn't hosted in the US, or is distributed anonymously by a peer-to-peer network. TCPA and CAN-SPAM are hardly what I'd call effective. I still get tons of spam calls and emails. I'm not saying legislation is a bad idea; just that it's not going to be able to put the genie back in the bottle.
- michaelt 6y ago
  Unlike spam (which can trivially be sent across jurisdictional borders) you can't point a new camera at a San Francisco resident without being in California.
  - da_big_ghey 6y ago
    Stream camera to box in other nation running recongiton model.
- dimitrios1 6y ago
  Sure, there are going to be smaller players, but they won't matter in the grand scheme of things. The FBI, or DOD isn't going to go scouring the crevices of the web and look through various sources, they want one big database that's easy to query, and likewise, a company like Clearwater wants to get big so it can be in a position of power, and of course, $$$.
  - salawat 6y ago
    You severely underestimate the lengths government will go to to end run around prohibitions, and how easily that can be accomplished by a private contractor.
    - dimitrios1 6y ago
      No, not really. I've considered that as well. It's ok if the government does it, there is oversight committees, there's the whole issue of the constitution, and eventually all will be known. Plus things can change. The PATRIOT act could very well be overturned one day. I am not saying shady actors won't get away with some shady stuff for a short while. I care more about private side business being allowed to do this unbounded.
- jacques_chester 6y ago
  You can also stop legitimate murderers from murdering by enforcing laws against murder. "It's hard" is not an answer to the question "should this be illegal?". It's a statement that comes later, when the budgets are being made.

whatshisface 6y ago

What if we gave people copyright over their likenesses? In fact, celebrities already have ownership of their likenesses. I can't sell Leonard Nimoy lunchboxes, for example. Clearview shouldn't be able to sell pictures of me either. If they want to sell my pictures, they should get in touch with me, and we can work out a licensing agreement. https://collectingtrek.ca/2019/02/03/leonard-nimoy-sued-paramount-and-won/ https://collectingtrek.ca/2019/02/03/leonard-nimoy-sued-para...

kadonoishi 6y ago
everybody has an NFT on their likenesses
salawat 6y ago
Then whose copyright takes pecedence, you, or your photographer? If you leave it up to contract law to answer it, we'll be in the same spot we're in now with a new template clause no one will ever read. Plus, it doesn't solve the more pressing fundamental issue of Third Party Doctrine giving government an end run around any prohibition of amassing such a system by hiring out the deed to someone unencumbered.
- whatshisface 6y ago
  Yours, because the copyright of a photocopy of a book remains with the author. No, because I don't have any legal relationship with street camera operators. This would not be a panacea for all privacy issues, it would specifically solve ones related to zero-touch trackers. No, because neither the government nor unencumbered entities can profit by selling works that I own the copyright to, nor can they profit from selling derived works.

CaptArmchair 6y ago

I only partially agree with that assertion. Regulating and restricting the use of facial recognition technology is entails creating civil and criminal liabilities. Such liabilities would make it prohibitively expensive for private initiatives to develop facial recognition products and services. Such legislation doesn't have to target facial recognition tech directly. In many jurisdictions, existing privacy legislation already puts up barriers. And legal cases involving Clearview are testing these frameworks. For instance, last year, privacy protection authorities in Canada launched a probe into Clearview and how it holds up legally (february 2020). Clearview subsequently shuttered it's operations in Canda (august 2020). https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/nr-c_200706/ https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/n... https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/an_200221/ https://priv.gc.ca/en/opc-news/news-and-announcements/2020/a... In Europe, there's the GDPR. Last year, Clearview was hit by a complaint in France. And just last month, february 2021, Hamburg Data Protection Authority ruled that Clearview clearly breaches the GDPR. https://www.businessinsider.com/clearview-ai-gdpr-complaint-jumbo-privacy-2020-7 https://www.businessinsider.com/clearview-ai-gdpr-complaint-... https://edri.org/our-work/reclaiming-your-face-from-clearview-ai/ https://edri.org/our-work/reclaiming-your-face-from-clearvie... https://noyb.eu/en/clearview-ai-deemed-illegal-eu https://noyb.eu/en/clearview-ai-deemed-illegal-eu For sure, legislation and enforcement don't root technology once it's out there. But that's not the point. If you live in a place where you don't have strong privacy rights, you, as an individual citizen, don't have any legal footing to begin with to stop anyone from appropriating your portrait and using that in ways you don't agree with.

ARandomerDude 6y ago

Think about this phrase but replace it with other crimes: > All legislation would do is create a situation where it's "illegal" to [commit some crime] even though just about everybody knows how to do so trivially and secretly. The list of crimes that fit that description is huge: - rob a convenience store - molest a child - commit insurance fraud - make a pipe bomb - ... We still outlaw those things, even though most people already know how to do them (or could figure it out quickly) because we don't want people doing them routinely and we're willing to force people to stop.

Nextgrid 6y ago
All of these things have negative externalities that are hard to conceal (except maybe the last one - if you never use your creation you'll be fine and the law is unlikely to catch up with you). The problem with facial recognition software is that it's very easy to conceal its usage. Businesses can use it secretly and then use parallel construction (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction) to explain how they obtained the information that actually originated from facial recognition.