A digital privacy advocacy is asking European authorities to arrest executives at US AI firm Clearview AI on grounds that the firm is allegedly flouting EU privacy legislation.
The Vienna-based digital rights outfit NGO Noyb claims the US company is scrapping billions of images from across the internet, including photos of ordinary European Union citizens, to fuel a surveillance system sold to law enforcement agencies and state actors worldwide.
“The facial recognition company is known for scraping billions of photos of Europeans and people around the world on the internet – and selling its facial recognition system to law enforcement and state actors,” Noyb said today. Its founder Max Schrems argues that the US company undermines basic principles of society.
“Facial recognition technology is extremely invasive. It allows for mass surveillance and immediate identification of millions of people.
“Clearview AI amassed a global database of photos and biometric data, which makes it possible to identify people within seconds.
“Such power is extremely concerning and undermines the idea of a free society, where surveillance is the exception instead of the rule,” he said.
Since 2022, data protection authorities in Greece, France, Italy, the Netherlands and the UK have all fined the company a total of almost €100 million for violating privacy laws.
Yet, despite the penalties, the firm is not acting in good faith.
“Clearview AI is simply ignoring the EU authorities,” it was said.
According to Noyb, the US-based firm has been largely able to dodge General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) enforcement in the EU and has been ignoring the bloc’s regulators’ orders.
“EU data protection authorities did not come up with a way to enforce its fines and bans against the US company, allowing Clearview AI to effectively dodge the law,” Noyb argued.
Compared to other US companies such as Meta, Google and Amazon, Clearview does not have an EU-based office, making it difficult to implement rules.
Without a mechanism to compel compliance, European regulators are left issuing penalties that, for companies such as Clearview, may amount to little more than warnings on paper.
US lawmakers have floated this loophole, exploited by US tech firm Clearview AI as a convenient model for Silicon Valley firms frustrated by European regulation.
For Schrems, Clearview AI “just spits in the face of EU authorities”.
Noyb said it intends to close the gaping enforcement loophole that is letting US tech firm Clearview AI flout Europe’s data protection laws.
Up to now, Clearview AI has only faced administrative fines under the GDPR. But under EU law, those are not the only possible consequences.
Article 84 of the GDPR lets EU countries add criminal penalties for the most serious data protection breaches, which allows prosecutors to treat certain GDPR violations as criminal offences and not just civil or administrative ones.
Noyb wants European authorities to go beyond fines and actually pursue Clearview and its executives under criminal law.
“If successful, Clearview AI and its executives could face jail time and be held personally liable, in particular if travelling to Europe,” the EU NGO said.
