Apple Sued for $1 Billion USD After Facial Recognition Leads to False Arrest
The lawsuit describes the system as “Orwellian surveillance.”
A teenager from New York has opened a lawsuit against Apple, claiming that the tech company’s facial recognition software led to a false arrest. Ousmane Bah was arrested on November 29 in relation to a series of Apple Store thefts across Boston, New Jersey, Delaware and Manhattan. According to the lawsuit, the real thief used a stolen ID featuring Bah’s name, address and personal information. This ID did not feature a photograph, so Apple reportedly used the face recognition software to associate the thief’s face with Bah’s details.
The $1 billion USD lawsuit alleges that Apple’s “use of facial recognition software in its stores to track individuals suspected of theft is the type of Orwellian surveillance that consumers fear, particularly as it can be assumed that the majority of consumers are not aware that their faces are secretly being analyzed.” Keep an eye out for more details over the case in the future.
In other tech-related news, Samsung has postponed the launch of its Galaxy Fold.
