Facebook develops facial recognition app that identifies employees

Facebook develops facial recognition app that identifies employees
Social media giant, Facebook, Inc. has been alleged for its involvement in numerous security and privacy-related scandals over the past few years. The company's stance on privacy has changed a bit, but the zeal to roll out new features has been putting Facebook in trouble lately.
Recently, the company made headlines when it confirmed the development of an internal facial recognition app that enabled its employees to identify their colleagues and friends. Sources cite that the facial recognition app could only detect friends and employees who have turned on the facial recognition feature.
Apparently, the app was developed between 2015 and 2016 but since then has been discontinued because of privacy concerns. One version of the facial recognition app could identify anyone on the social network. The company has acknowledged it has developed a facial recognition app, however denies that it could identify any member on its platform.
According to Facebook spokesperson, to learn about new technologies, the company regularly build apps to use internally. The app is only available for Facebook employees and could only recognize staffs and their friends who have facial recognition feature enabled on their device.
For the record, the app was developed prior to the Cambridge Analytics Scandal in 2018, which triggered a scrutiny on the company and its efforts to secure users' privacy. Cambridge Analytics had gathered data of around 87 million Facebook users without their consent. Following the scandal, FTC (Federal Trade Commission) penalized Facebook a $5 billion for breaching the privacy of users.
In the past, Facebook also faced criticism for using the facial recognition feature. The 'tag' feature criticized Facebook for Illinois biometric privacy law. However, The feature used to be turned on by default unless a user chose to opt out of it, butFacebook made it opt-in this year.
Source Credit - https://www.cnet.com/news/facebook-built-a-facial-recognition-app-for-employees/