Petersburg authorities identify pyromaniacs, it was also used to identify and harass young women. Meant to facilitate making new friends, the app was also used for more sensitive purposes. The app automatically matched the image to people’s social media pages on Vkontakte, Russia’s leading social network. Soon after this triumph, the first face recognition app developed by the startup, FindFace, sparked controversies over user privacy. Shortly after its inception in 2015, NtechLab won a top world championship in face recognition, overtaking more than 100 competitors, including Google. This Moscow-based startup has had an eventful history. The company said it would investigate the leak and take appropriate measures.

In an exchange with Business Insider, NTechLab conceded that the leaked list included “a few current clients” as well as organisations that had tested its technology without actually buying it. Intel and Nokia denied that they had ever used FindFace, while Bosch, Honeywell and SpaceX did not answer Business Insider’s questions.

Responding to Business Insider’s inquiries, Philip Morris, CasinoSoft and MutualLink said they had tested NtechLab’s technology but did not proceed beyond the trial period. Not all these organisations are active users of the technology, however. Among the organisations featured in the list are Interpol, the Brazilian police and the Royal Thai Army as well as the FSB and other Russian organisations.Īlso featured on the list are major Western companies such as Bosch, Dell, Honeywell, Intel, Nokia, Philip Morris, SpaceX and others. Its approach is similar to that developed by US startup Clearview AI, which was recently fined in the UK for illegally creating a face recognition database.īusiness Insider has seen a list of nearly 1,100 FindFace licensees from some 60 countries, which it claims was shared by an anonymous source.

According to a report published last week by US publication Business Insider, a range of Western tech firms are users of FindFace, a controversial face recognition technology developed by Russian startup NtechLab, reports Adrien Henni for East West Digital News.įindFace matches faces against social media accounts, regardless of privacy rights, among other facial recognition capabilities.

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