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The Secretive Company That Might End Privacy as We Know It

A little-known start-up helps law enforcement match photos of unknown people to their online images — and “might lead to a dystopian future

nytimes.com

Clearview has shrouded itself in secrecy, avoiding debate about its boundary-pushing technology. When I began looking into the company in November, its website was a bare page showing a nonexistent Manhattan address as its place of business. The company’s one employee listed on LinkedIn, a sales manager named “John Good,” turned out to be Mr. Ton-That, using a fake name. For a month, people affiliated with the company would not return my emails or phone calls.

While the company was dodging me, it was also monitoring me. At my request, a number of police officers had run my photo through the Clearview app. They soon received phone calls from company representatives asking if they were talking to the media — a sign that Clearview has the ability and, in this case, the appetite to monitor whom law enforcement is searching for.

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“'I’ve come to the conclusion that because information constantly increases, there’s never going to be privacy,’ Mr. Scalzo said. ‘Laws have to determine what’s legal, but you can’t ban technology. Sure, that might lead to a dystopian future or something, but you can’t ban it.'”

“'It’s creepy what they’re doing, but there will be many more of these companies. There is no monopoly on math,’ said Al Gidari, a privacy professor at Stanford Law School. 'Absent a very strong federal privacy law, we’re all screwed.'”