John,

Imagine hopping into an Uber or Lyft and having a surveillance device immediately scan your face—harvesting data about your age, race, gender, and even attempting to analyze your emotions––and then show you an advertisement based on its assessment of your biometric information.

Looking a little sad? Here’s an ad for anti-depressants. Does the algorithm think you’re a senior? Here’s an ad for nearby retirement homes.

Rideshare companies are currently allowing exactly this: a company called Alfi has been partnering with Uber and Lyft drivers to install in-vehicle tablets that use facial recognition and analysis software to invade your privacy, just to show you “personalized” advertisements during your ride.^1,2

Tell Uber and Lyft to ban facial recognition and any other surveillance-based advertising technology on rideshare users and drivers.

TAKE ACTION

There’s no telling what these companies will do with your data once they scan your face, especially since there aren’t laws in most places to prevent them from collecting, storing, and even selling your sensitive biometric information to other advertising companies, data brokers, or even the government.

But here’s the good news: Alfi is doing all of this without Uber’s or Lyft’s permission, and all those companies have to do to stop this is add a line to their driver agreements banning the use of this technology on rideshare users.

Legislators have already started digging into rideshares using facial recognition on advertising tablets.³ Now these companies need to hear from you. Tell Uber and Lyft to ban invasive, discriminatory facial recognition and emotion scanning software.

Together,

Caitlin at Fight for the Future

Footnotes:

1. Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-09-01/meme-stock-alfi-s-facial-recognition-ad-technology-fans-privacy-concerns

2. Miami Herald: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article254262513.html

3. Vice: https://www.vice.com/en/article/epnawa/senators-send-letters-to-uber-and-lyft-over-face-tracking-ad-tablets

Fight for the Future works to protect your rights in the digital age.