Topline
The Federal Trade Commission announced Tuesday that, as part of a proposed settlement, it is banning convenience store chain Rite Aid from using facial recognition technology for surveillance purposes for five years after Rite Aid allegedly failed to “prevent harm to consumers” and have “reasonable procedures” in place tied to a facial recognition program it was using to detect shoplifters.
Key Facts
In Tuesday’s announcement, the Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection Samuel Levine said Rite Aid’s “reckless use of facial surveillance systems” left its customers harmed and “facing humiliation” after it falsely tagged consumers, often women and people of color, as shoplifters.
The FTC said Rite Aid initiated its AI-based facial recognition technology to identify customers who shoplifted or had otherwise “problematic behavior,” but the complaint alleged Rite Aid didn’t take reasonable measures to stop harm on customers who were falsely identified and accused of shoplifting.
In some instances, Rite Aid employees followed people who had been incorrectly matched around stores, made them leave before completing purchases, called the police on them and publicly accused them of shoplifting, according to the FTC’s complaint.
Rite Aid will also have to implement an information security system and safeguards against similar harm if it uses similar automated systems in the future, and it will have to discontinue the technology “if it cannot control potential risks to consumers,” the FTC said.
Chief Critic
Though Rite Aid said in a statement Tuesday that it is “pleased to reach an agreement with the FTC and put this matter behind us,” the company defended itself and said the “safety of our associates and customers is paramount.” “We fundamentally disagree with the facial recognition allegations in the agency’s complaint,” read the statement. “Rite Aid stopped using the technology in (a small, pilot) group of stores more than three years ago, before the FTC’s investigation regarding the Company’s use of the technology began.”
Big Number
Thousands. That’s how many false positive matches Rite Aid’s system generated from 2012 to 2020 using low-quality photos, some of which came from Rite Aid’s security cameras, employee phones or news stories, the FTC said. The technology falsely matched people with customers who were flagged “based on activity thousands of miles away” and sometimes “flagged the same person at dozens of different stores” across the country.
Key Background
Rite Aid allowed the creation of a “watchlist database” of people it claimed had engaged in or tried to engage in criminal activity at its stores, according to the FTC. The entries into the database included peoples’ names, photos, birth years and descriptions of what they had done to get on the list, though the photos were often low-quality and uploaded by employees, leading to mismatches with other customers. The FTC alleged that Rite Aid directed its store security to get “as many enrollments as possible.” Rite Aid, which is headquartered in Pennsylvania, filed for bankruptcy in October after struggling to keep up with rivals Walgreens and CVS, and faced a number of lawsuits tied to its alleged role in worsening America’s opioid crisis.
Further Reading
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