John,

Knocking on a friend's door? Bringing a neighbor a piece of mail? Walking down the street in front of a home with a Google Nest camera? Your facial data might be getting stored indefinitely, thanks to invasive facial recognition technology in the doorbell. Pledge now and refuse to add faces to Google Nest’s “familiar faces library” and call on Google to disable this feature immediately.

Take Action

Google Nest users can now use “familiar face detection” to save your face alongside your name, allowing customers to store an entire library of images of you--with or without your knowledge.¹ On top of enabling invasive spying on neighbors, this tech puts your unchangeable biometric data at risk of abuse and theft in mass databases²––databases you may have no idea you’ve been added to in the first place.

Frighteningly, Google Nest footage isn’t even end-to-end encrypted, despite these cameras being privy to what may be some of our most personal moments—at our doorstep.³ We must reject this normalization of surveillance devices in our communities and the covert, nonconsensual storing of sensitive data.

This technology is so intrusive that in Illinois, one of the few states where lawmakers have taken action to prohibit the collection of biometric data without people's knowledge and consent, Google has entirely disabled the “familiar face detection” feature, knowing it violates privacy laws.⁴

Our communities need privacy and protection from surveillance––not doorbells that spy on neighbors and create troves of data for abusive law enforcement agencies.

Together in the fight for privacy,

Shreya & the team at Fight

Footnotes

1. Google Nest Wants Your Friends' Faces: Should You Give In? | CNET
2. Beware—This Open Database On Google Cloud ‘Exposes 200 Million Americans’: Are You At Risk? | Forbes
3. Google could share Nest camera footage with cops without a warrant | Input
4. The Best Law You’ve Never Heard Of |The New York Times