Facebook seeks permission from Europeans to use facial recognition
Facebook began this week to ask permission from European and Canadian users to identify them using facial recognition technology, the British news channel BBC reported. The information disclosed refers to one of the permits that the social network implements in order to comply with the security guarantees required by the European Union (EU) for the use of consumer's private information.
On the use of facial recognition technology, Facebook explains that "as part of the updating of Facebook's privacy policy, the option of activating this function will be given to all people in the European Union and Canada." It adds that it is completely optional for anyone to use this function that has been activated in most countries of the world for more than six years, Efe reported. Its purpose is to help the user to protect themselves from the use by strangers of personal photos and also facilitates access to the identity of those who are in the images to those who have vision problems, it adds. Users will be asked to review information about it and choose whether or not they "want us to use our partners' data to show you ads."
According to the British media, Facebook implements the new configurations before the entry into force of the General Regulation of Data Protection of the EU on May 25. The law aims to review and reinforce policies to safeguard the personal identity of citizens of member countries, who will have the right to know what data is stored about them and can eliminate them. It also states that companies will need the explicit consent of users before using their data and should be more specific about how they use them.
In addition, companies that break the rules could face fines of up to four percent of their annual global billing. The social network started looking for matches with users outside of Canada in 2011, but stopped doing so for EU citizens specifically the following year, after protests from regulators and privacy activists. Currently, the company faces strong criticism after the scandal about the use of personal information of more than 87 million of its Internet users by political consultant Cambridge Analytica. Recently, the EU privacy control agencies announced that they will investigate more deeply the collection of personal data on Internet platforms.