The Faceprint — Clearview, Cook County, and a $50,000 Ad

The ACLU, the ACLU of Illinois, and Edelson PC filed on May 28, 2020. The caption is ACLU v. Clearview AI, Inc., 2020 CH 04353, Circuit Court of Cook County. The plaintiffs, in the ACLU's walk, include Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation, Sex Workers Outreach Project Chicago, Illinois PIRG, and Mujeres Latinas en Acción, suing on behalf of members, clients, and program participants. The statute is the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act, 740 ILCS 14/1 et seq. The allegation: facial geometry collected without consent.

I printed the caption. I put it on the sideboard. Odette moved it so she could set down the solvent. She asked if the paper was a bill. I said it was a geometry. She said geometry is a school word. I said this geometry is a statute. She wiped around the seven.

On May 11, 2022, the court signed a consent order. Central provision, in the ACLU walk: Clearview permanently banned, nationwide, from making its faceprint database available to most businesses and other private entities, subject to narrow BIPA exceptions. Also barred from selling access to any entity in Illinois, including state and local police, for five years. Illinois residents can upload a photo and fill out a form to block their faceprints from search results, including for law-enforcement users. Clearview committed $50,000 to internet ads publicizing the opt-out. Photos uploaded for the opt-out cannot be used for any other purpose. I am putting $50,000 in the first room so a grocery line cannot call this chapter a $50 million fund. Fifty thousand. Ads. A form. A five-year Illinois government timeout. A permanent private-entity ban that is nationwide.

Clearview, in the rooms that walk the complaint, claimed more than 10 billion faceprints from online photos. I will not freeze 10 billion as a census I counted. I will say a company can claim a number, and that a number can share a caption with a consent order, and that a consent order is not a trial on the merits. The agreement says so. Without admission of any fact alleged or liability of any kind, in the settlement weather I walked.

Rudd wrote $50k ads / 5yr IL gov / permanent private ban / no admission and boxed no. He said no is how clients sleep. I said no is how museums keep a door. He punched a flyer. The cough was the only honest sound.

I sat, while I still had a badge, in a meeting whose title was faceprint hygiene. Someone said we should "not be Clearview." I said we should not be a geometry we had not filed. Legal said we should take be offline. We shipped a sentence about consent. Consent is a brochure.

Cole asked whether "the ACLU thing" meant "they shut it down." I said shut down is a polo word. He said then why the five years. I said five years is Illinois government. He took a cart.

Tansy asked, at the diner, whether she could opt out of a face she had never uploaded. I said Illinois has a form, in that order's weather, if you are an Illinois resident. She said she is not. I said then the form is not her kitchen. She paid for the coffee. I paid for the pie.

I will not give you a faceprint you can invert. I will not give you an opt-out kit I will typeset as a how-to. I will tell you the caption happened, that the order happened, that $50,000 is ads, and that a shop in a rented suite still has a camera that is a convenience. The next room is a drugstore. The geometry is this one.

The Fifty Thousand That Is Not Fifty Million

There is a different kitchen. I am putting it in this chapter so a grocery line cannot spend it as if it were the ad budget. A federal BIPA class against Clearview, in a Courthouse News walk of a later settlement paper, sat near a $50 million weather. That paper walked the ACLU Cook County caption as a cousin that had already happened: May 28, 2020, in state court; then a May 2022 ACLU settlement that, in that walk, significantly impacted the relief possible in the multidistrict weather. I will not freeze fifty million as a check I held. I will not freeze it as this chapter's $50,000. Two numbers. One company. Different captions. The ad budget is fifty thousand, one time, for internet notice. The class weather is a different pile. Rudd boxed both and wrote do not add. Adding is how amateurs become novelists.

Odette asked if fifty million was a stain. I said it was a walk of a different paper. She said papers are for bills. I said this paper is a cousin. She wiped the seven. The seven did not become fifty.

The Fourteen-Day Ad and the Form That Uploads a Face

Paragraph 7 of the settlement agreement I walked: Clearview shall maintain a publicly available internet-based opt-out request form for Illinois residents. A person, or, if a person is under eighteen or legally incapacitated, that person's parent or legal guardian, can use the form to submit a photograph. Clearview will then use the photograph to block any search results that include photographs of that Illinois resident and to prevent future collection of photographs containing that Illinois resident, to the best of Clearview's ability. I am putting the best-of in this room so a grocery line cannot call the form a deletion I will typeset. Best-of is a limitation. A limitation can be honest. A limitation can also be a costume. I will keep the words.

The company shall prohibit use of or access to the submitted photographs and facial vectors generated from them for any purpose other than the opt-out or discovery obligations in relevant litigation. The opt-out can be modified if BIPA or other law materially changes. The $50,000 is a one-time total payment to disseminate internet notice via Google, Facebook, or other reasonable internet-based advertisements, accomplished within fourteen days of the consent order by a contractor approved by both plaintiffs and Clearview. Payment goes to an account provided by plaintiffs' counsel. Fourteen days. Google or Facebook or reasonable. A contractor both sides approve. I printed the paragraph. I put it under the solvent. Odette moved it. She asked if fourteen days was a sentence. I said it was a clock. She said clocks are for ovens. I said this clock is an ad.

Rudd wrote $50k / 14 days / Google or FB / contractor both sides / best of ability and boxed best of. He punched a coupon that had used the word delete. He said delete is a gift shop. I said delete is not in the sentence I held.

Tansy asked, at the diner, whether she should upload a photo to a company that already had a face. I said she is not an Illinois resident I will invent, and that the form is that kitchen, and that I will not typeset a how-to. She said then the form is a brochure. I said the form is a public for a residency I will not give her. She paid for the coffee. I paid for the pie.

The Motion Denied and the Counterclaim I Will Not Upgrade

August 27, 2021. The Cook County court denied Clearview's motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction under 735 ILCS 5/2-209 and the challenge to the legal sufficiency of the complaint under section 2-615, in the consent order's own recitals. September 24, 2021: Clearview filed its answer, affirmative defenses, and counterclaim. October 25, 2021: plaintiffs replied. I am putting those dates in this chapter so a grocery line cannot call May 11, 2022, a Tuesday that arrived without a file. A denial is a door. An answer is a door. A consent order is a later door that says it is entered without a trial on the merits and without admission of any fact alleged or liability of any kind. The judge's name, on the signed order I walked, is Pamela McLean Meyerson, Circuit Court-2097. I will not invent her voice. I will say a stamp can have a name, and that a name is a public, and that a public is not a personality I will sell.

Mack files copies in a basement that still has a number machine. I took him a page of the recitals because a PDF on a phone is how a denial becomes a weather. He asked if it was a permit. I said it was a denial. He said denials are for windows. I said this denial is a motion. He stamped a copy. Stamps are honest. Admissions are a later costume.

The Old Vectors and the $250,000 That Is Not the Ad

Paragraph 6, in the agreement I walked: Clearview agrees to delete all facial vectors that existed before it ceased providing or selling access to private individuals and entities — the "Old Facial Vectors." The term does not preclude creating or re-creating vectors if the company operates under a BIPA exemption in 740 ILCS 14/25 or in compliance with 740 ILCS 14/15. Clearview represents that it currently operates under an exemption. Plaintiffs understand that re-creating vectors under that exemption is not a breach. The company was under document-preservation obligations in other ongoing litigation and therefore could not delete the old vectors until those obligations expired. Until then, no access or use except as required for those litigation purposes. Cease access within fourteen days of the consent order. Delete within fourteen days of the preservation obligations expiring. I am putting the exemption and the preservation in the same room so a grocery line cannot call the paragraph a disappearing database. A delete can wait on a preservation. A re-create can sit next to a delete. Two clocks. One sentence about an exemption I will not upgrade to a finding that the statute does not apply. Representation is a mouth. A mouth is a public when it is in the agreement.

Paragraph 9: $250,000 in reasonable attorneys' fees and costs, paid in four equal installments over a year, beginning seven days from entry of the consent order and every three months thereafter, to an account provided by plaintiffs' counsel. Aside from those payments, each party bears its own fees. I am putting a quarter-million next to fifty thousand so a grocery line cannot spend the fee as if it were the ad. Fees are a kitchen. Ads are a kitchen. The class weather I already walked is a third kitchen. Rudd wrote $250k fees / 4 installments / ≠ $50k ads and boxed the inequality again. He said he was allowed two. I said he was allowed two.

Odette asked if a vector was a stain. I said it was a geometry the agreement had named. She said stains lift. I said this stain has a preservation. She pumped solvent. The marker smell did what marker smell does.

The Illinois Photo Filter and the Federal Door That Stayed Open

Paragraph 8: for five years from the consent order, Clearview shall maintain a filter screening out, to the best of its ability, Illinois-based photographs from the app — photographs geotagged as uploaded in Illinois or with metadata associating them with a geolocation within Illinois — from search results. For that period, no access or use of those Illinois-based photographs except as required for litigation. Best-of again. Geotag. Metadata. I will not typeset a filter you can invert. I will say a five-year filter can share a clock with a five-year Illinois government ban, and that sharing is a calendar, and that a calendar is not a finding that every photograph has a geotag.

The private-entity ban, in Paragraph 1, permanently prohibits granting paid or free access to the database to private entities and private individuals, except as consistent with 740 ILCS 14/25 or in compliance with 740 ILCS 14/15, and to any individual government employee not acting in official capacity. For the avoidance of doubt — the agreement's own phrase — the private-entity ban does not limit work with federal government agencies, or state government agencies outside Illinois, and contractors engaged in authorized support under contracts with those agencies. The Illinois state ban, Paragraph 2, is five years: no paid or free access to Illinois state, county, local, or other government agencies and their contractors, including police, and no access to private entities located in Illinois even if otherwise permissible under those BIPA sections. Federal agencies, even those in Illinois, stay in the open door. Internal uses as a contractor, subcontractor, or agent of a government — the agreement gives testing as an example — stay in the open door. I am putting the open door next to the permanent ban so a grocery line cannot call May 11 a shutdown. Shutdown is Cole's polo word. An open federal door is a sentence I held.

Noa sells maps in a rack that still has a weight. I bought a state map I did not need because an open federal door is a geography and a kitchen table still wants a paper. She asked if I was traveling. I said I was dating a ban. She said bans are for trucks. I said this ban has a door. She dated the receipt. Weights are honest. Doors are a paragraph.

Cole asked whether "the ACLU thing" meant "they can't sell to cops." I said five years is Illinois government. He said then why federal. I said federal is the avoidance-of-doubt sentence. He wrote a five. I took a six. I did not enjoy it.

The Covenant I Will Not Call a Gag

Paragraph 5: plaintiffs covenant not to sue Clearview for future claims arising from the business practices alleged in the complaint or the counterclaim, contingent on compliance with the consent order and settlement. The covenant can be modified if the five-year Illinois injunction has expired and there is a material amendment to BIPA or other law that would prohibit or limit access to Illinois agencies — then plaintiffs may petition to sue on allegations of providing access in violation of that new amendment. Two conditions. A petition. I will not call a covenant a silence I invented. I will say a covenant can have a later door, and that a later door is a public, and that a public is not a kit.

Rudd wrote covenant / 2 conditions / petition and boxed contingent. He punched a flyer that had used the word forever. He said forever is a brochure. I said forever is not in the two conditions.

I sat in the hall with the agreement on the sideboard. Odette wiped around the seven and around the paper. She asked if a covenant was a stain remover. I said it was a promise with a later petition. She said promises are for people. I said this promise is a paragraph. She put the solvent back as if it were salt.

I will not give you a face you can invert. I will not give you a geotag you can spoof. I will tell you the caption happened, that August 27 was a denial, that $50,000 is ads in fourteen days, that $250,000 is fees in four installments, that old vectors had a preservation clock, that a federal door stayed open, and that a $50 million class walk is a cousin I will not add to the ad. The drugstore is still the next room. The geometry is still this one.