Flickr users are alleging that Microsoft, Google and Amazon violated privacy laws when the companies used their images in a data set aimed to lessen the racial and gender biases in their facial recognition technologies.

In a trio of class action complaints, two Illinois residents allege that Microsoft, Google and Amazon violated the state's Biometric Information Privacy Act by using IBM's Diversity in Faces Dataset, made up of about 1 million Flickr images.

Loevy & Loevy and Carlson Lynch filed the lawsuits Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and the Western District of Washington.

The lawsuits were surfaced on Law.com's Legal Radar.

"In recent years, an 'arms race' has developed amongst for-profit companies seeking to become market leaders in the facial recognition arena," the attorneys wrote. "Critical to winning this battle has been to[sic] the ability to claim a low identification error rate—i.e., the for-profit companies want to herald the accuracy of their products, including accuracy in identifying woman[sic] and people of color." That's where IBM's Diversity in Faces Dataset comes in. IBM created the dataset to help minimize inaccuracies and biases in facial recognition technology and began offering the dataset to companies such as Microsoft, Google and Amazon.

The lawsuits allege that the companies improved their facial recognition products with biometric identifiers gleaned from images of Flickr users Steven Vance and Tim Janecyk, "thereby making those products and technologies more valuable in the commercial marketplace." Vance and Janecyk contend that the companies did not offer the proper disclosures and consents required by Illinois law. In addition to statutory damages of up to $5,000 per BIPA violation, the plaintiffs are asking the court for an injunction prohibiting the companies from continuing to use and profit from class members biometrics.

The lawyers underlined the tech companies' ties to Illinois, noting that Microsoft, for instance, "conducted extensive business within Illinois related to the facial recognition products it unlawfully developed using Plaintiffs' and Class Members' biometric identifiers and information." Underlining the companies' connection to Illinois could possibly be an attempt to circumnavigate issues related to standing and venue when litigating out-of-state BIPA complaints—issues that were raised in Facebook's facial recognition lawsuit in the Northern District of California.

A Microsoft spokesperson said the company is aware of the suit and reviewing it. "We take privacy seriously and we are committed to ensuring our AI technology is developed and used responsibly," the spokesperson said. Google and Amazon did not respond immediately to a request for comment Wednesday afternoon.

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