Privacy concerns over the implementation of facial recognition on Google Glass have been growing. Memories of Google’s Street View privacy fiasco are still fresh, and the repercussions are still being worked through. But a week ago news that at least one software company is already working on a face recognition app for Glass emerged. “The new software from Lambda Labs, who are based in San Francisco, raises the prospect of never forgetting a face again, and also of internet recommendations for who Google Glass wearers should meet at large social gatherings,” reported the Telegraph. “It will launch to computer programmers in days.”
But it isn’t just civil rights groups that have concerns over Glass. Earlier this month eight members of Congress wrote to Larry Page with eight tough privacy related questions, and requested a response by 14 June 2013. “We would like to know”, asked the first, “how Google plans to prevent Google Glass from unintentionally collecting data about the user/non user without consent?”
Other questions included, “Can a non-user or human subject opt out of this collection of personal data?” And if a device is recycled/resold, “would there be any product capabilities incorporated into the device to ensure that one’s personal information remains private and secure?”
On Friday Google responded in perhaps the only way it could: “As Google has said for several years, we won’t add facial recognition features to our products without having strong privacy protections in place. With that in mind, we won’t be approving any facial recognition Glassware at this time.”
Refusal to approve and successfully preventing are, however, two different things. The basic operating system for Glass is Android. Android’s success is built upon openness; and it may prove difficult to put the genii back in the bottle. Apple has tried the ‘walled garden’ approach to prevent unapproved apps being run on iOS, and it hasn’t worked – millions of users are thought to have rooted devices to run their own apps.
In April, Jay Freeman, Apple jailbreaker and founder of the Cydia store of unapproved apps, easily rooted his earlier version of Glass. Not approving facial recognition apps will not be the same as preventing broken Glass apps.