Facebook parent Meta Platforms will no longer use facial recognition for photos and videos shared to the company\u2019s flagship social network, saying it needs to weigh the benefits against growing concerns about the technology.<\/p>\n
The social media giant has used facial recognition since 2010 to encourage people to tag friends or family members in photos and videos, and to alert people if another user uploads a picture that they\u2019re in. It eventually added some privacy constraints, and in 2017 it let people opt-out of facial recognition.<\/p>\n
In 2019 Facebook turned off the feature by default, though users could choose to turn it on.<\/p>\n
Facebook on Monday said it will shut down this system for privacy reasons, and will delete more than 1 billion \u201cfacial recognition templates\u201d it has collected over the years. More than a third of Facebook\u2019s daily active users are currently using the feature, the company wrote in a\u00a0blog post<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n Artificial intelligence-based facial recognition is controversial industrywide – not just at Facebook – though the social network\u2019s use of the technology led to a legal settlement that cost the company $650 million in 2020. In that case, Facebook was accused of illegally collecting biometric data about users without their consent.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery new technology brings with it potential for both benefit and concern, and we want to find the right balance,\u201d Meta wrote in the post.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the case of facial recognition, its long-term role in society needs to be debated in the open, and among those who will be most impacted by it.\u201d<\/p>\n