Facebook isn’t the only company offering compensation to Illinois citizens who have been subjected to alleged privacy infractions. According to The Verge, Google has agreed to pay $100 million to resolve a class-action lawsuit alleging that Photos’ “Face Grouping” function violated Illinois’ Biometric Information Protection Act (BIPA).
If you appeared in a photo on Photos between May 1st, 2015, and April 25th, 2022, the settlement will allow you to claim between $200 and $400.
Google is accused of breaking the law by collecting and analyzing faces without providing adequate notice, obtaining “informed” consent, or disclosing data retention rules to the general public.
Face Grouping is a feature that detects faces and automatically organizes them into groupings to help you find photographs of certain people.
You have until September 24th to file a claim, and you have until August 10th to protest the settlement conditions. The date for the final approval hearing has been set for September 28th.
We’ve reached out to Google for feedback. Face Grouping was defended by the firm in a statement to The Verge, emphasizing that categories were only visible to you and could be disabled.
The amount of the settlement is low. In 2021, Facebook settled a lawsuit over its defunct face-based Tag Suggestions service by paying $650 million.
However, this may not be the last major payment in the near future. Snap is now dealing with a class-action lawsuit alleging that it illegally collected face and voice data for its augmented reality effects, and it might incur a similar cost if the plaintiffs win.
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