Apple sued for $1 billion after its facial recognition software led to false arrest
Apple did not respond to a request for comment. The lawsuit describes the system as "Orwellian surve
(Web Desk) – An 18-year-old teenager from New York has filed a $1 billion dollar lawsuit against Apple, claiming the tech giant’s facial-recognition software wrongly blamed him for stealing from Apple stores.
NYPD officers arrested Ousmane Bah on November 29, after falsely linking him to a series of Apple store thefts in Boston, New Jersey, Manhattan, and Delaware.
According to the lawsuit, the real thief used a stolen ID featuring Bah’s name, address and personal information. The ID did not feature a photograph, so Apple reportedly used the face recognition software to associate the thief’s face with Bah’s details.
At the time of Boston theft where the thief stole $1200 worth of goods, Ousmane was attending his senior year prom in Manhattan.
A detective working the case viewed surveillance footage from the Manhattan store and concluded that the suspect “looked nothing like” Bah, his lawsuit states.
Charges against Bah have been dropped in every state except New Jersey, where the case is still pending.
Apple’s “use of facial recognition software in its stores to track individuals suspected of theft is the type of Orwellian surveillance that consumers fear, particularly as it can be assumed that the majority of consumers are not aware that their faces are secretly being analysed,” the lawsuit states.
Apple did not respond to a request for comment.
