Hyderabad: Microsoft pulls database of facial images

Hyderabad: In a silent move, tech giant Microsoft has removed its database of face images from the internet that has been used to train AI systems around the world, says a report.

According to a report in Finanical Times, the database, dubbed MS Celeb, has  been used by military researchers and Chinese firms such as SenseTime and Megvii.

First published in 2016, the database, which Microsoft describes as the largest publicly available facial recognisiton data set,  contained over 100 lakh images of around 1 lakh people.

The report further states that the images and videos in the database were scraped off the web and didn’t have the necessary consent from the people.
While Creative Commons license allows academic reuse of photos, the images in the database were being used by various private firms to train their facial recognisition systems.

Microsoft, which took down the database days after reports said it was being used by other companies also, said to FT, “The site was intended for academic purposes. It was run by an employee that is no longer with Microsoft and has since been removed.”

The report also states that two other data sets have also been taken down since the report was published in April, including the Duke MTMC surveillance data set built by Duke University researchers, and a Stanford University data set called Brainwash.

Brainwash used footage of customers in a café called Brainwash in San Francisco's Lower Haight district, taken through a livestreaming camera.

Duke did not respond to requests for comment. Stanford said it had removed the data set after a request by one of the authors of a study it was used for. A spokesperson said the university is "committed to protecting the privacy of individuals at Stanford and in the larger community.”