Clearview AI Violated Canadian Privacy Law (www.cbc.ca) 53
sinij shares a report from CBC.ca: American technology firm Clearview AI violated Canadian privacy laws by collecting photos of Canadians without their knowledge or consent, an investigation by four of Canada's privacy commissioners has found. The report found that Clearview's technology created a significant risk to individuals by allowing law enforcement and companies to match photos against its database of more than three billion images, including Canadians and children.
The commissioners called for Clearview to stop offering its technology in Canada, stop collecting images of Canadians and to delete the photos of Canadians it had already collected in its database. If the company refuses to follow the recommendations, the four privacy commissioners will "pursue other actions available under their respective acts to bring Clearview into compliance with Canadian laws," the statement said. However, the four acknowledged that under current laws, and even under proposed changes to federal privacy laws, their ability to penalize the company or force it to comply with Canadian orders is limited. "What Clearview does, is mass surveillance and it is illegal," federal privacy commissioner Daniel Therrien told reporters Wednesday. "It is an affront to individuals' privacy rights and inflicts broad based harm on all members of society who find themselves continually in a police lineup." "This is completely unacceptable."
The commissioners called for Clearview to stop offering its technology in Canada, stop collecting images of Canadians and to delete the photos of Canadians it had already collected in its database. If the company refuses to follow the recommendations, the four privacy commissioners will "pursue other actions available under their respective acts to bring Clearview into compliance with Canadian laws," the statement said. However, the four acknowledged that under current laws, and even under proposed changes to federal privacy laws, their ability to penalize the company or force it to comply with Canadian orders is limited. "What Clearview does, is mass surveillance and it is illegal," federal privacy commissioner Daniel Therrien told reporters Wednesday. "It is an affront to individuals' privacy rights and inflicts broad based harm on all members of society who find themselves continually in a police lineup." "This is completely unacceptable."
Said every country but the good ol' USA (Score:5, Insightful)
... where mass surveillance in the name of 'safety' is just par for the course. And hey, another big business profiting off the backs (well, faces) of everyone once again. Oh, and once again, to their general detriment. But who's counting anyhow?
Re:Said every country but the good ol' USA (Score:5, Insightful)
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Don't be so hard on USA, North Korea also doing it.
It's probably worse in the US that can afford better tech tools.
innocent kid (Score:3)
Mark Zukerberg : He's not your dad
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North Korea doesn't have mobs of violent racists trying to break into the capital to murder the elected government.
North Korea has the kind of stability and security that US politicians, law enforcement, and social planners can only dream of.
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London, UK, is really bad. There's a camera on every corner.
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London, UK, is really bad. There's a camera on every corner.
Only one per corner? You've only got the Orwellian Starter Kit, and you think it's "bad" already.
Mere childs play.
Re:Said every country but the good ol' USA (Score:4, Insightful)
... where mass surveillance in the name of 'safety' is just par for the course.
It's not done for safety at all. Seriously, it's 100% profit-driven.
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Profit
Eeew! Are we allowed to say icky words like that in our comments!?!
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Nobody has ever taken issue with people making a profit. People have only taken issue with people making a profit at the expense of others. The reason for this is called "empathy" which is something that people like you always are always in short supply.
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It's not a zero sum game. You don't have to make a profit at the expense of others; you can also do so in benefitting them. I mean, most businesses would insist that this is what they do, including Clearview, but many are simply lying, and many others have been overcome by cognitive dissonance. As the old adage says, "it's impossible to convince a man of something that will cost him his livelihood."
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consider.
it is not machines that are at fault.
it is not businesses that are at fault.
it is people.
follow the money
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> follow the money
I tried that, but the van driver and the security guard got upset.
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lol.
i am thinking that the user for the money would also be attentive
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... where mass surveillance in the name of 'safety' is just par for the course.
This comment is so hilarious in the current climate of "everything China does is wrong and US will do the opposite" sentiment pervasive in the US.
You know which country is huge on mass surveillance in the name of safety? China.
The funny thing is, they actually succeeded. China put cameras in all train/subway stations, airports, public areas, etc, and all the robbery/pick pocket/etc so common 10-20 years ago were ALL GONE. Around 15+ years ago, if your company has an office in China, it was so easy to hea
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Then again, of course they would report that it works. Otherwise they would lose one of the publicly valid reasons to have the surveillance, only leaving the authoritarian reasons.
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Then again, of course they would report that it works. Otherwise they would lose one of the publicly valid reasons to have the surveillance, only leaving the authoritarian reasons.
Do you also accuse anyone who got a better score than you school that they cheated? It must feel good to say anyone else must have cheated to best you, it makes you feel invincible and no need to do any better.
As I mentioned in my original post, anyone who actually worked with anyone in China can easily verify that crimes like robbery or pickpocket was a problem 15 years ago, and is now no longer.
Sure, don't believe me, don't go out to look for facts and continue to enjoy living in your bubble.
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>"You know which country is huge on mass surveillance in the name of safety? China. The funny thing is, they actually succeeded. "
It is neither funny nor good, however, just obvious.
It is easy to have tons of "safety" by monitoring and policing and suppressing everything everyone does. When there is no freedom, there is great safety. Safety and freedom are diametrically opposed. I would rather be a little unsafe and have freedom, especially when I am empowered to defend myself... yet another freedom.
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It is easy to have tons of "safety" by monitoring and policing and suppressing everything everyone does.
The funny part is the US is putting up tons of cameras with little to show in terms of crime rate reduction, the crime rate was basically flat since 2000, and it is almost 10x that of China (4.96 vs 0.53).
https://www.macrotrends.net/co... [macrotrends.net]
One excuse was that the US police cannot (by law) to use camera footages to catch criminals (which begs the question of what the cameras were for), furthermore that excuse is not untenable thanks to the 06Jan riots where there was suddenly no problem with using any availabl
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... where mass surveillance in the name of 'safety' is just par for the course. And hey, another big business profiting off the backs (well, faces) of everyone once again. Oh, and once again, to their general detriment. But who's counting anyhow?
Ah, to be clear, Americans probably didn't have a damn clue when they clicked "I Agree" on the EULA for this.
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To be fair however most of them have no intention of complying with whatever they agreed to so they got that going for them, which is nice.
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I find privacy just weird as a Canadian.
Do I want the government or anyone performing mass surveillance? No.
Yet, I really don't understand modern views on proportionality. Our handling of Covid really twists my brain in knots.
The government of Canada is willing to do all kinds of emergency measures including curfews, shutting down society, preventing you from seeing friends and family... all massive violations of personal freedom.
I'm not saying it wasn't needed/ That's for everyone to debate. But here's the
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We as a country have decided that privacy is an important right. Constitutionally it follows from the right to be free from unreasonable searches, basically our equivalent of America's 4th amendment.
Why should the cops be able to bypass the courts by contracting a private company? Why do you think that if something is publicly available, that you can do what you want with it?
I note that Americans got upset about lists of gun owners being published and in America, if you find some copyrighted material on the
Copyright (Score:1)
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Seems like they would have also violated copyright laws in the wholesale downloading, storing and processing of images.
No doubt they'll claim that "it was publicly available, so it's all fair [for any] use [,man!]".
However, it could probably be countered that they profited from the use of those images, so claims for copyright infringement might stick.
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Canada doesn't have fair use, instead we have fair dealing, similar but different. I believe we also hold the rights to our images.
Chivalry made simpler (Score:2)
Tech to bring in the social score society hell (Score:1)
Wait until you see what FaceFirst is doing (Score:2)
Clearview, not clear (or alclear) (Score:2)
Pathetic... (Score:2)
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Besides, if you read the article you'll see that the company has a pretty good argument - "Clearview AI's technology is not available in Canada and it does not operate in Can
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Well, ideally they'd bring charges so that due process would happen and the big problem seems to be selling the data to the police so they can bypass the courts oversight.
It's true that due to lack of presence in Canada, we can't do much, though we could play American and bust any of their executives who happen to stop in Canada.
Aren't they getting ahead of themselves? (Score:3)
You don't punish someone because it is possible for their work to be misused. That is an injustice. The just course of action is to apply specific rules prohibiting specific forms of misuse. Don't tell Clearview they can't look at public photos, define the limits on how the trained systems can be used. If you don't want cops to be able to track people as they move around, say that. If you don't want businesses tracking people, say that. But maybe you want to have the option for law enforcement to have help identifying someone who is on video committing a crime. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, just make rules that restrict the ability to do so and say that a computer match alone is not sufficient to arrest someone.
In other words - don't punish the toolmaker, define how the tool can not be used.
And do so through the legislative process. Don't give the power to bureaucrats, the elected representatives of the people must make the rules.
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Why should Clearview be able to monetize my image without my permission?
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In other words, making it public was you granting them permission.
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I've never posted my image anywhere on the internet. Doesn't mean someone hasn't though and I still own the rights to my image. If someone posts a movie to Facebook or YouTube, does that mean I'm free to use it? They made it public. Used to sit outside the drive in and watch movies too, since I could see it in public, I guess I could have made a copy.
Hey commissioners, (Score:2)
Great idea, going after Clearview. I'm all for it!
May I ask: where are you at with Google, Microsoft, Amazon Facebook, Akamai and CloudFlare?
No its not AI who broke the law. (Score:1)
Clearview has a point here (Score:4, Interesting)
Clearview asserts that they are not bound by Canadian law because they don't have "substantial connections" to Canada. They have a point and any judgement that might be obtained against them is likely to have no direct consequences for them. However, it does have consequences for potential customers located in or otherwise subject to Canadian law. And that is probably the point of this "action".
They also allege that obtaining photos from public sources isn't surveillance or a privacy issue. They probably have a point there, too. There are, however, other potential issues with doing that. (Copyright, perhaps? Especially if they actually distribute the photos to anyone.)