See Freddy’s talk: “Clearview AI: The Shady Company Tracking Your Face Online” on November 14, 2020, at this year’s online event.

Clearview AI: The Shady Company Tracking Your Face Online

Over the last year, Freddy has been involved in investigating the use of facial recognition technology in surprising places, including in counter terrorism fusion centers. Primary documents became a front page exposé on Clearview AI, a secretive surveillance company that is scraping billions of images off of social media for its facial recognition application. Clearview has sold its facial recognition system to dozens of companies and many law enforcement agencies. Yet the company does more than just search faces; it also compiles links to LinkedIn, Facebook, and other social media platforms, allowing police to create full profiles of individuals’ lives. This talk will focus on the facial recognition technology, working with journalists on these tips, and the ensuing fallout.

Freddy Martinez is a technologist and expert on surveillance who currently works as an expert on the Freedom of Information Act.  As part of Lucy Parsons Labs, he has spearheaded many investigations into government abuses from ICE to the local police department. He was previously a Ford-Mozilla open web fellow at Freedom of the Press Foundation. During his fellowship, he worked on democratizing access to public records requests with a focus on police accountability and transparency.

A longtime Chicagoan, his focus for the future include issues around cell phone privacy, working with marginalized communities, and the intersection of digital rights and activism.

He has a cat named (little) Snowden.