Clearview facial recognition service, web-scraping preserved with court approval

A U.S. district court judge has granted final approval to the settlement of Clearview AI’s multi-district litigation over alleged biometric data privacy violations. The deal grants claimants a combined 23 percent stake in the company in the case of an initial public offering, a share estimated last year to be worth $51.75 million.

During the hearing, Clearview’s attorneys said the company’s facial recognition service has enabled the FBI to search for victims of online child sexual abuse material three times more effectively. The settlement allows those services to continue operation, they say.

Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman found that opposition amongst claimants was minimal, and that policy concerns raised by objectors may be legitimate, but are not grounds to reject the settlement. Coleman also considered “the complexity, length, and expense of future litigation in this case” in approving the deal, MLex reports.

Class members filed 16 objections and 1,008 requests for exclusions, which Coleman wrote is “remarkably low” given the size of the class and media attention paid to Clearview. An estimated 70 percent of U.S. adults were contacted by the notice program, on average 2.6 times each.

A joint amicus brief filed by 23 attorneys general argued that the settlement is inadequate because it does not provide injunctive relief, and Coleman acknowledged that there are legitimate concerns about how Clearview’s opt-out program works.

Coleman declined to force a change to the opt-out program, however, noting a risk of judicial overreach.

If Clearview goes public, claimants who live in Illinois would receive 10 shares each, residents of California, New York and Virginia would receive 5 each and those in other states would get one each.

Under the terms of a previous agreement with the ACLU to settle allegations under Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA), Clearview only sells its facial recognition app and access to its cloud database to law enforcement and government agencies.

Article Topics

Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA)  |  biometrics  |  Clearview AI  |  facial recognition  |  lawsuits