Mother Jones Publishes Investigation About Extensive Far-Right Ties of Federal Government’s Most Widely Used Facial Recognition Contractor
Clearview AI’s Co-CEO Said He Wanted to “Take Down These Lefties”
Mother Jones today published an investigation into the extensive far-right ties of Clearview AI, a company whose powerful facial recognition technology is widely used by ICE, the FBI, and other federal agencies.
The investigation by Luke O’Brien is based on interviews with industry insiders, court documents, and thousands of newly obtained emails, texts, and other records, including internal communications from ICE. It shows how the company’s founders discussed using the technology—which is now in the hands of the Trump administration—to target immigrants, people of color, and progressives.
“The technology that Clearview AI deploys has alarmed privacy experts for years, but our investigation—into the radical views of its founders and their enthusiasm for racial profiling—adds a chilling new dimension,” said Clara Jeffery, Editor-in-Chief of Mother Jones. “When facial recognition technology is designed and peddled by extremists, and deployed by an administration with authoritarian impulses, all Americans should be concerned.”
Emails obtained by Mother Jones show Hal Lambert, a top GOP fundraiser and Clearview AI’s new co-CEO, discussing his desire to “take down these lefties,” railing against the “communist academia left,” and pushing to use the company’s technology to prove an election fraud conspiracy theory.
Records show that Clearview AI’s co-founder, Hoan Ton-That, was steeped in an alt-right environment that included neo-Nazis and other extremists; was obsessed with race and IQ; and solicited ideas from eugenicists while he built the technology, going so far as exploring the possibility of identifying gay people based on their facial features.
While Clearview AI has been fined around $100 million for violating the privacy laws of numerous European countries, according to rulings by European privacy authorities, the company plans to pursue additional contracts with the Defense Department and Department of Homeland Security.
