Amazon Photos Faces Class-Action Lawsuit Over Alleged Biometric Privacy Violations in Illinois
A federal judge has certified a class-action lawsuit against Amazon, alleging that its Amazon Photos service illegally collected facial biometric data from users in Illinois. The lawsuit, Hogan v. Amazon.com, Inc., claims that Amazon failed to comply with the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) by not obtaining informed consent before collecting biometric data through its image recognition feature. According to the complaint, Amazon Photos did not secure written consent, explain the purpose of data collection, or outline its data retention policies. Amazon's defense, citing its Terms of Service, was rejected by the court, which noted the absence of key terms like 'biometric identifier' or 'facial recognition' in the terms. The ruling also highlighted that users could activate the image recognition feature without being presented with the required notices. The class includes Illinois residents whose faces were processed in their Amazon Photos accounts between October 18, 2016, and January 31, ...
