Facebook starts issuing checks of $397 to millions of people living in Illinois as part of an agreement settlement in a class-action lawsuit over its facial recognition tech.
The court case was from 2015 and it concerns the company’s former photo-tagging software which collected resident’s biometric data without their permission or knowledge. Although, Facebook has stopped using the fingered feature since 2021.
Here is how the feature worked: it recognises users in a photo or video by matching their facial features to its data base and suggesting that they be tagged.
The lawsuit had accused the Meta-owned social media company of breaking state privacy law by encroaching on people’s privacy. Any Facebook users in the state who had either posted a photo of themselves or had been tagged during the affected period could file a claim and join the lawsuit.
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Over the years and during the course of the case, Facebook had repeatedly filed to have the case dismissed to no avail. It appears that the last straw was when it was certified as a class action lawsuit.
Facebook allegedly attempted to settle for $550 million but met opposition from a federal judge. Eventually, the company agreed to paying a total of $650 million to residents who are members of the class action, about 1.6 million people.
Many residents reported receiving their payments already and if you are a member of the lawsuit, or filed a claim, yours could be on the way already. Of course, the deadline to file the claim already closed on November 23, 2020.
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