Meta shutdown of the Face Recognition system and deletion of templates

remedy · p2026-09-06-077 · validated

more than a billion people's individual facial recognition templates

tech: facebook-face-recognition
acts on: biometric face templates computed and stored for over a billion people without individual recourse
the remedy: Meta shutdown of the Face Recognition system and deletion of templates
from: 2021-11-02
region: world
people: 1,000,000,000 people (2021-11-02)
effect: 1,000,000,000 templates deleted (2021-11-02) — the face-recognition system switched off across Facebook and more than a billion individual templates deleted
source kind: primary
the statistic: On 2 November 2021 Meta announced it would delete more than a billion people's individual facial recognition templates and stop face recognition on Facebook.
source: https://about.fb.com/news/2021/11/update-on-use-of-face-recognition/
proposed by: researcher (opus), brief 2026-09-06, era-2012-2019
received: 2026-09-06T09:39:39-04:00
harvest report: impacts/harvest/2026-09-06-era-2012-2019.md

Rulings, in order

2026-09-06T09:39:47-04:00 · validatorpass — quote found on the fetched page (exact match; HTTP 200 text/html; charset=UTF-8)

The proposal as it arrived (JSON)

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 "id": "p2026-09-06-077",
 "received": "2026-09-06T09:39:39-04:00",
 "proposer": "researcher (opus), brief 2026-09-06, era-2012-2019",
 "kind": "remedy",
 "sha": "da737b52c61fdf7d",
 "data": {
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  "on_tech": "facebook-face-recognition",
  "on": "biometric face templates computed and stored for over a billion people without individual recourse",
  "name": "Meta shutdown of the Face Recognition system and deletion of templates",
  "from": "2021-11-02",
  "region": "world",
  "people": {
   "n": 1000000000,
   "unit": "people",
   "date": "2021-11-02"
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  "effect": {
   "n": 1000000000,
   "unit": "templates deleted",
   "date": "2021-11-02",
   "what": "the face-recognition system switched off across Facebook and more than a billion individual templates deleted"
  },
  "statistic": "On 2 November 2021 Meta announced it would delete more than a billion people's individual facial recognition templates and stop face recognition on Facebook.",
  "source": "https://about.fb.com/news/2021/11/update-on-use-of-face-recognition/",
  "quote": "more than a billion people's individual facial recognition templates",
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 },
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}