Clearview AI—Clearview AI scraped 60+ billion facial images from the internet without consent to build surveillance database
Clearview AI built a facial recognition database of over 60 billion facial images by scraping photographs from social media platforms, news websites, Venmo, and other publicly accessible online sources — all without the knowledge or consent of the people depicted. The database grows by approximately 75 million images daily. Users can upload a photo and receive links to everywhere that face appears online, enabling identification of virtually anyone from a single photograph.
Scoring Impact
| Topic | Direction | Relevance | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intellectual Property Ethics | -against | secondary | -0.50 |
| Surveillance Technology | +toward | primary | -1.00 |
| User Privacy | -against | primary | -1.00 |
| Overall incident score = | -1.103 | ||
Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (critical ×2) × confidence (0.66)
Evidence (2 signals)
NPR reported on Clearview AI's mass scraping of facial images without consent
NPR covered Clearview AI's practice of scraping billions of images from social media platforms without users' knowledge or consent, and the resulting backlash from tech companies who sent cease-and-desist letters.
NYT investigation revealed Clearview AI scraped billions of photos from social media
Kashmir Hill's New York Times investigation exposed that Clearview AI had secretly scraped over 3 billion photos from Facebook, YouTube, Venmo, and other platforms to build a facial recognition database sold to law enforcement.