Episode 63 - Your Face, Time To Scrub?

Data Privacy Detective

Facial recognition. It’s a hot topic. Targeting, misidentification, and doxing - the dangers are real. So are the benefits – finding criminals and solving crimes, searching for relatives and old friends, researching history, conducting social research, sharing with friends over a lifetime. Kashmir Hill’s penetrating cover article in the March 21, 2021 New York Times Magazine, “Your Face is Not Your Own,” details how our photos are scraped and used by companies far beyond what we imagine. Our images are available from public sources such as driver’s licenses. Many arise from our choice– through Facebook and Instagram postings, directories, newspaper and other media sources. As the TV series Cheers’ theme song sang, “Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.” But now it’s not just the neighborhood pub. It’s the internet, where everybody knows your name, and everybody can find your face. What to do? That’s where scrubbing comes in. Scrubbing is the effort to erase, stop, or minimize the spread of a digital posting. Scrubbing is a challenge. It can be expensive. Certain scrubbing services charge annual fees of $100 a year or more per person. In this episode we discuss what options are available to you, what governments are experimenting with to find a balanced solution, and if there is any hope to truly erase your face from digital history. If you have ideas for more interviews or stories, please email [e-mail].