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The US government paid $9.2 million to Clearview AI, a company that scraped over 50 billion photos from the internet without consent.

That includes selfies, tagged photos, and images from Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, dating apps, and public blogs. If your face has appeared online in the last decade, it’s likely in their system.

Clearview’s tool lets any paying user upload any face and instantly see everywhere that person appears online, in political rallies and posts, family photos, location data, and more.

You never agreed to this. But if you’ve been online, you’re in the face database.

And it’s not just ICE; the FBI, local police, and other government agencies are already using it. Private industry is also using a separate version of the software. Mass biometric surveillance isn’t a future threat. It’s already a reality.

AI That Recognizes Your Face — and Your Life

Clearview scrapes and stores images to build permanent facial fingerprints, then links them to searchable online profiles. It doesn’t matter if the post is years old or deleted; if it was once public, it has probably been captured.

This isn’t just tech innovation, it’s digital surveillance on a mass scale. A single photo could be used to map out your:

• Online presence
• Political affiliations
• Relationship history
• Physical location patterns
• Family and friends network

This is less about crime prevention and more about control.

The lack of any federal legislation has motivated 23 state attorneys general to initiate protections.

States with biometric privacy laws (23 total, as of 2025):

• Private right of action (individuals can sue): Illinois (Biometric Information Privacy Act, California, Washington
• Attorney general enforcement and explicit biometric laws: Texas, Oregon, Virginia, Connecticut, Colorado
• Attorney general enforcement via border comprehensive privacy laws: Utah, Iowa, Indiana, Tennessee, Montana, Delaware, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Nebraska, Florida, Maryland, Minnesota, Vermont, Kentucky, Rhode Island

In the Clearview AI Biometric Information Privacy Act lawsuit, an Illinois federal court gave victims 23 percent ownership in the company instead of cash. The ruling leaves Clearview free to continue its surveillance practices, effectively signaling that privacy laws can be broken so long as you pay for the privilege.

Reactions to the pay-to-play deal reflected broader fears about weakened privacy and unchecked facial recognition use:

This shocked me that police can just essentially get this unvetted tool from some random company and download it to their phones and just start using it in active investigations. … All of a sudden, the Department of Homeland Security is getting access to it and officers around the world. — Kashmir Hill, privacy journalist

Face recognition technology is a special menace to privacy, racial justice, free expression, and information security. Our faces are unique identifiers, and most of us expose them everywhere we go. … Taken together, these systems can quickly, cheaply, and easily ascertain where we’ve been, who we’ve been with, and what we’ve been doing. — Adam Schwartz, the Electronic Frontier Foundation

Who’s Using It and Why It Matters

Clearview clientele includes:

• DHS/ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement)
• The FBI
• State and local police agencies

What began as a tool to fight child exploitation and terrorism is now being quietly normalized for routine policing, traffic stops, protester identification, and even low-level investigations.

No Oversight, No Consent

There is currently no federal law regulating the use of facial recognition data in the US. That means:

• No public transparency
• No requirement to inform you if your face is scanned
• No legal requirement for consent
• No consistent process to remove your image

Laws in places like Illinois (under the BIPA) offer some protection, but most Americans are completely exposed.

Your Face, Their Asset

AI Facial recognition is the “end of anonymity,” and Clearview is making that future right now.

Your digital footprint is exposed to relentless invisible threats, not just what you share, but data on your movements and image captures of your face, collected and used without your consent. This constant surveillance imposes a level of vigilance that erodes quality of life for everyone.

What You Can Do About It

Check Your State’s Laws: If you live in Illinois, California, or Texas, you may have more rights under biometric privacy laws.

Push for Federal Oversight: Civil rights groups like the ACLU and the Electronic Frontier Foundation are pushing for national biometric privacy legislation.

Limit Your Image Footprint: Consider adjusting privacy settings, avoiding facial tagging, and minimizing public posts that include your face.

Stay Informed: Technology moves faster than the law. Surveillance tools can shift from niche to mainstream in mere months — further eroding your privacy without you even realizing it.

Facial Recognition and Legal Boundaries: The Clearview AI Case Study

From Regulatory Insight: “In this episode of the Regulatory Oversight podcast, Stephen Piepgrass welcomes David Navetta, Lauren Geiser, and Dan Waltz to discuss the $51.75 million nationwide class settlement involving Clearview AI and its broader implications. The conversation focuses on Clearview AI’s facial recognition software, which has sparked controversy due to its use of publicly available images to generate biometric data.”

ICE To Pay Up To $10 Million For Clearview Facial Recognition To Investigate Agent Assaults

The author writes, “As ICE ramps up its attempts to locate and deport undocumented immigrants, it’s faced a massive backlash in some parts of the U.S., including protests and, on occasion, attacks of ICE agents. Now, to identify people who have assaulted agents, ICE has turned to Clearview AI, a provider of a controversial facial recognition technology that compares images of people to a massive database of face images scraped from social media and other public websites.”

US To Share Biometric Data With Chile ‘To Track Criminals,’ Homeland Security’s Noem Says

The author writes, “The United States will deploy biometric technologies in partnership with Chile to control migration and disrupt criminal networks, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Wednesday during a visit to the South American nation. ‘This arrangement is going to serve as a bridge to help Chile and the United States work towards bringing criminals to justice and knowing who is in our countries perpetuating crimes,’ Noem said while signing the preliminary agreement with Chile’s Security Minister Luis Cordero and Justice Minister Jaime Gajardo.”

Linkage Attacks Expose Identity Risks in Public ECG Data Sharing

From Cornell University: “The increasing availability of publicly shared electrocardiogram (ECG) data raises critical privacy concerns, as its biometric properties make individuals vulnerable to linkage attacks. Unlike prior studies that assume idealized adversarial capabilities, we evaluate ECG privacy risks under realistic conditions where attackers operate with partial knowledge. …  Our findings underscore the urgent need for privacy-preserving strategies, such as differential privacy, access control, and encrypted computation, to mitigate re-identification risks while ensuring the utility of shared biosignal data in healthcare applications.”

Tracking US State Biometric Privacy Legislation

From Husch Blackwell: “Illinois, Texas, and Washington have passed legislation regulating private entities’ collection and use of biometric information. In 2025, more states are introducing similar bills that address biometric privacy issues. Our interactive map tracks those bills. Click the states to learn more.”