AI Facial Recognition Firm Deletes Millions of OkCupid User Photos Shared Without Consent

AI facial recognition company Clarifai says it has deleted the three million user photos dating app OKCupid shared with it without users’ consent.

Earlier this month, Match Group, which owns platforms including Tinder, OkCupid, and Match.com, agreed to settle a U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) lawsuit alleging that it improperly shared millions of users’ personal data, including photos used to train facial recognition technology, without permission.

According to the FTC, after Clarifai contacted one of OkCupid’s founders in 2014, the dating app provided access to nearly three million user photos, along with demographic and location data. At the time, Clarifai was developing image recognition systems that rely on large datasets to train algorithms, a practice that has become widespread but has also raised concerns about consent and transparency in the AI industry.

The FTC alleged that sharing the data violated OkCupid’s own privacy policy because users were not given an option to opt out. It also claimed that OkCupid and Match later attempted to obscure their relationship with Clarifai when The New York Times inquired about the arrangement for a story.

OkCupid and its parent company did not admit wrongdoing as part of the settlement with the FTC. While the FTC is not able to fine companies for this type of first-time offense, the agency says that OkCupid and Match are “permanently prohibited from misrepresenting or assisting others in misrepresenting” the nature of their data collection and sharing.

According to a report by Reuters, the settlement drew criticism from some Democrats who said it did not go far enough. But in a document seen by Reuters, Clarifai certified to the FTC on April 7 that it had deleted the photo data. The company also told the office of U.S. Representative Lori Trahan on April 16 that it had deleted any models trained on the data and had not shared the data with third parties. Trahan calls the confirmation “a step in the right direction,” but says “the FTC should have never settled for less in the first place.”

Delaware-based Clarifai offers facial recognition technology that identifies individuals in images and video, and can analyze age, race and gender, according to its website. Clarifai’s founder sought the data in 2014, when some OkCupid executives were Clarifai investors, according to court documents.

“We’re collecting data now and just realized that OKCupid must have a huge amount of awesome data for this,” Clarifai founder Matthew Zeiler wrote in an email to OkCupid co-founder Maxwell Krohn.

The FTC says the data transfer breached OkCupid’s privacy policy and a federal law against deceptive business practices.

Separately, Tinder recently announced it is testing a feature that uses AI to scan users’ camera rolls to select photos and suggest aspects of their personality.

Image credits: Header photo licensed via Depositphotos.