The social networking giant Facebook lost the first round of the legal battle against certain plaintiffs who claim that it has “illegal” collected and stored biometric data of users that arise from their faces in photos.
Biometric data are information about your physical characteristics and this is primarily used by technology companies as a form of identification.
On Thursday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Illinois’ biometric privacy laws override California’s, even if users signed terms of use agreements that California law says apply. The ruling could set a precedent, as Illinois’s strict biometric privacy laws could override laws in other states, on a potentially important issue like facial recognition, which is increasingly being used by Facebook and other tech giants.
Facebook claimed that users could not file a complaint, based on the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA), because they had agreed from the outset that California law would govern their disputes with the company and that BIPA does not apply to “tag suggestions (tag suggestions) “.
The court held that Illinois law applies and that the plaintiffs have made a declaration under BIPA.
The plaintiffs claim that Facebook had not obtained their consent for storing facial data, which is used for recognizing users in images, so that they can be «tagged» more easily by their friends, in violation of the Illinois BIPA.
The «tag suggestions» feature is available in the US, but was removed in the EU in 2012 after privacy regulators raised objections.
Facebook argued that the plaintiffs had agreed to their legal relationship with the company to be governed by California law when they registered as Facebook users. It also argued that BIPA does not apply to its “tag suggestions” feature.
However, the court ruled that Illinois law continues to apply and stated that the BIPA claim can proceed.
The Provincial Judge, James Donato, in his ruling, stated: «The Court accepts as true the claims that Facebook's facial recognition technology, which includes a scan of facial geometry, was performed without the plaintiffs' consent.»
The court decision showed that the case was filed by some residents of Illinois under Illinois law, but the parties agreed to refer the case to the California court.
Facebook was also hit with a lawsuit over its plan to issue new shares last month. The social media was not immediately available for comment.
