Facebook considers adding profile photos to facial recognition.
The attainable move, that Facebook unconcealed in associate degree update to its knowledge use policy on Thursday, is meant to enhance the performance of its "Tag Suggest" feature. The feature uses automatic face recognition technology to hurry up the method of labeling or "tagging" friends and acquaintances United Nations agency seem in photos announce on the network.
The technology presently mechanically identifies faces in fresh uploaded photos by scrutiny them solely to previous snapshots within which users were labelled. Facebook users will opt to take away tags distinguishing them in photos announce by others on the positioning.
The changes would return at a time once Facebook and different net companies' privacy practices ar underneath scrutiny, following the revelations of a U.S. government surveillance program.
Facebook, Google opposition and different firms have insisted that they need ne'er participated in any program giving the govt direct access to their laptop servers which they solely offer data in response to specific requests, when careful review and PRN by law.
Facebook Chief Privacy Officer Erin Egan same that adding members' public profile photos would provide users higher management over their personal data, by creating it easier to spot announce photos within which they seem."Our goal is to facilitate tagging so that people know when there are photos of them on our service," Egan said.
She stressed that Facebook users uncomfortable with facial recognition technology will still be able to "opt out" of the Tag Suggest feature altogether, in which case the person's public profile photo would not be included in the facial recognition database.
Facial recognition technology has been a sensitive issue for technology companies, raising concerns among some privacy advocates and government officials. Tag Suggest, which the company introduced in 2011, is not available in Europe due to concerns raised by regulators there.
Google's social network, Google+, also employs similar technology, but requires user consent. And it has banned third-party software makers from using facial recognition technology in apps designed for its Glass wearable computer.
Egan said Facebook was not currently using facial recognition technology for any other features, but that could change.
"Can I say that we will never use facial recognition technology for any other purposes? Absolutely not," Egan said. But, she noted, "if we decided to use it in different ways we will continue to provide people transparency about that and we will continue to provide control."
Facebook also amended its Statement of Rights and Responsibilities on Thursday, adding and tweaking the language so that members under 18 years of age are deemed to have affirmed that a parent or legal guardian has agreed to allow marketers to use some of their personal information in ads.
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