Security News > 2020 > January > Facebook to Pay $550M to Settle Class Action Case Over Facial Recognition
Facebook has agreed to pay $550 million to Illinois users to settle a class action lawsuit filed over the use of its face-tagging technology to collect facial-recognition data on its social media platform.
The suit stems from a class-action proceeding from Facebook users in Illinois over a feature called Tag Suggestions, which identifies Facebook users in photos based on biometric identification technology and suggests that they be "Tagged" in photos on someone else's profile based on that info.
The payout is not the first Facebook has made over its use of technology and consumer privacy issues, and it likely won't be the last.
The company made changes to its facial recognition feature in September in response to the proceeding, allowing users to opt out of the Tag Suggestions feature.
At the time Facebook said it was replacing its platform's default Tag Suggestions setting-which automatically offered suggestions for users to be tagged in friends' photos-with a new privacy button, called Face Recognition.