Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) is facing another lawsuit over accusations that its subsidiary Instagram was using phone cameras without the consent of users. The lawsuit alleges that the use of cameras without consent was to collect facial recognition data from its users.
A New Jersey Instagram user filed a lawsuit alleging that the app was covertly using her camera to record her. The accusations line up with two previous lawsuits, where Instagram was accused of using cameras to record facial recognition data on users to gauge how they reacted to advertisements. The complaint specifically alleges that there was no consent given for the use of the phone's camera for data collection, and that Instagram's privacy policy does not note this use.
Facebook has since denied that it was illicitly using users' phone cameras, instead claiming that the notification that Instagram was using a user's camera as "an error" and that it had been fixed.
For anyone that regularly follows the daily headlines, accusations of privacy violation are nothing new for Facebook or any of its subsidiaries. Accusations of privacy violations are shockingly common for Facebook, which regularly finds itself under the scrutiny of the federal government, including paying hefty fines to the FTC.
The latest lawsuit is the third consecutive suit alleging non-consensual use of a user's smartphone camera by the Instagram app. In July, Facebook attempted to settle a suit by Illinois residents, but the deal was rejected by a US District Judge, which resulted in the case heading to trial in a San Francisco federal court. Facebook's run-ins with disgruntled users and regulators over privacy concerns are a recurring headline in the tech world. Recently, Irish regulators requested that Facebook cease sending the data of European users back to the United States. The move by Irish regulators is only the most recent of Facebook's encounters with Europe; the company had previously lost a major court case in Germany regarding its privacy policy, which could set a precedent in how much of the developed world addresses the tech giant.
In general, Facebook is no stranger to bad press, something well documented in previous Passport to Wall Street articles. Concerns that Facebook was being used as a platform to spread vitriolic, racist content prompted a mass protest by the Stop Hate for Profit group, a movement that came about as racial tensions in the U.S. were stoked by the killings of several unarmed black individuals at the hands of police. The meeting between Facebook and the SHP went poorly, with organizers feeling as if Facebook wasn't taking them seriously.