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Image commercially licensed from: Unsplash
On Thursday, Texas General Ken Paxton sued Google, claiming the tech company violated the state’s biometric privacy law.
According to Paxton, Google collected users’ voiceprints and facial recognition data without their knowledge or consent.
The lawsuit
Paxton filed the lawsuit in the Midland County District Court in Texas.
It alleges that the company’s facial and voice recognition in Google Photos and smart speakers violated the state’s Capture or Use of Biometric Identifier Act.
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Complaints
With Google Photos, the tech giant scans uploaded images, identifying and categorizing subjects like people who don’t know their faces have been scanned or saved.
The company also allegedly listened to Texans without considering the speaker’s consent to Google’s indiscriminate voice printing.
The complaint also claimed that Google’s Nest Hub Max, the smart home display with an integrated camera, was a “modern eye of Sauron.”
The Nest Hub Max watches people, waiting to identify a face it knows.
“All across the state, everyday Texans have become unwitting cash cows being milked by Google for profits,” said the complaint.
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Texas and biometric data
The Red State is one of the few states to have a law regulating the use of biometrics.
Ken Paxton’s lawsuit marks the second time Texas has invoked the 2009 law to sue a company.
In February, Texas claimed that a now-closed Facebook photo tagging tool violated the Texas biometric law.
The Facebook tool was also the subject of a $650 million biometric privacy agreement in Illinois last year.
The state has other lawsuits against Google, including two consumer protection cases and an antitrust case against the company’s digital ads.
Reference:
Texas sues Google over alleged ‘indiscriminate’ biometric data collection
