Google settles biometric data privacy lawsuit over attempts to weed out bias

Google has reached a settlement agreement over its use of an open-source dataset allegedly containing images of people from Illinois for training facial recognition algorithms.

The tech giant’s use of the open-source Diversity in Faces dataset developed by IBM to address biometric algorithmic bias violated Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA), the plaintiffs originally alleged back in 2020. Some of the images in contained were drawn from a Flickr dataset that included biometric data of people from Illinois, according to the plaintiffs.

Now the parties have filed a stipulation of dismissal, after agreeing to an unspecified settlement.

The suit was challenged on grounds of extraterritoriality and dismissed in March of 2024, but the plaintiffs amended the complaint, and Google was only able to have it partially dismissed in December.

The parties now have 60 days to complete their obligations under the settlement.

Article Topics

biometric data  |  biometric dataset  |  Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA)  |  Google  |  lawsuits