Clearview AI

Clearview AI is a provider of facial-recognition research tools (an updated version called Clearview 2.0, was released in March 2022) for law enforcement agencies to identify both perpetrators and victims. As of March 2022, the company had entered into contracts with over 3,100 police agencies in the US. In March 2023 it was reported that its tool had been used over a million times by the US police. In January 2022, the company received a patent from the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for its ability to collect images and information publicly available on the internet and match them with similar photos to identify individuals. However, in an interview, the company’s CEO Hoan Ton-That has iterated that the software is only used for law enforcement at present and that the company had no plans to launch a version targeting private customers. However, despite the company’s claims that it only works with law enforcement agencies, a customer list leaked in February 2020 revealed the names of private companies such as Walmart and Macy’s.

The company claims to have a database of more than 50 billion images (as of November 2024) said to be scraped from social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn. Over January and February 2020, these companies demanded that Clearview AI stop scraping data from their websites. Clearview AI CEO Hoan Ton-That stated it only collects publicly available images and is protected by the US Constitution’s First Amendment. The consequences of these claims are yet to be determined. 

Given the claims mentioned above concerning working with private companies and using scraped data, the company has stopped operations in several regions within the US, Canada, Australia, Italy, and the UK over violations of privacy laws in relation to collecting photos of citizens without their knowledge or permission. Hence the company, which has operations in more than 25 countries, continues to expand. For example, the company has signed a USD 500,000 contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a federal law enforcement agency under the US Department of Homeland Security, a USD 18,000 contract with the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), and a USD 50,000 contract with the US Air Force in 2021. In April 2022, the company also disclosed plans to launch facial recognition for commercial use, targeting banks and private businesses.

In September 2024, The Dutch Data Protection Authority (DPA) fined Clearview AI EUR 30.5 million (~USD 33.7 million) for violating Europe's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), where the company was accused of creating an illegal database with unique biometric codes.