Facebook’s battle with European Union regulators over the social media giant’s newest photo-sharing app highlights one major problem with the federal biometric data protection laws in the United States—there aren’t any.
Regulators blocked the roll-out of Facebook’s new Moments app in Europe last week because of its use of facial recognition technology. Moments allows Facebook users to share photos privately within a group and automatically tags all those pictured based off Facebook friend networks. To do this, Moments leverages users’ “faceprints.” Much like a fingerprint, a faceprint is made up of physical characteristics unique to an individual that can be used as an identifier. The main concern of European regulators is that because Moments doesn’t have an opt-in feature—users can only opt-out—it essentially uses an individual’s faceprint without his or her permission. As a result, Moments will be turned off in Europe until the company develops an opt-in mechanism, according to a statement Richard Allan, Facebook’s head of policy in Europe gave The Wall Street Journal.
The post Facebook Has Your Faceprint, Here’s Why That Matters appeared first on Trunews:.
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