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MSG probed over use of facial recognition to eject lawyers from show venues
The operator of Madison Square Garden and Radio City Music Hall is being probed by New York's attorney general over the company's use of facial recognition technology to identify and exclude lawyers from events. AG Letitia James' office said the policy may violate civil rights laws.
[...]
In December, attorney Kelly Conlon was denied entry into Radio City Music Hall in New York when she accompanied her daughter's Girl Scout troop to a Rockettes show. Conlon wasn't personally involved in any lawsuits against MSG but is a lawyer for a firm that "has been involved in personal injury litigation against a restaurant venue now under the umbrella of MSG Entertainment," NBC New York reported.
Madison Square Garden's Facial Recognition Mess: Everything We Know
Madison Square Garden's Facial Recognition Mess: Everything We Know:
MSG Entertainment is using facial recognition to identify, accost, and remove attorneys involved in lawsuits against it. It's doubling down on doing it.
[...] Over the past three months, multiple lawyers in the New York area have come forward with dramatic accounts of being denied entry into Madison Square Garden and other venues also owned by MSG Entertainment. The common factor in their stories? Each of them were spotted by the company's facial recognition system. That system was looking for lawyers from an estimated 90 law firms with active litigation against Madison Square Garden or MSG who were placed on a list denying them entry into the venues. The venue justifies banning the attorneys, many of whom aren't personally involved in the lawsuits, because their presence somehow "creates an inherently adverse environment." New York's Attorney General, on the other hand, says that practice may violate state civil rights laws. Madison Square Garden first rolled out facial recognition systems to its venues in 2018 with the stated goal of increasing security.
"This is bad, and it's just one example of how facial recognition could be used to infringe on peoples' rights," Fight for the Future Director Evan Greer said in a statement. "This technology puts music fans, sports fans, and others at risk of being unjustly detained, harassed, judged, or even deported."
Previously:
MSG Allegedly Used Facial Recognition to Remove Rival Attorney From Rockettes Show
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday February 01 2023, @02:15PM (5 children)
How did they get the right people? If they want to block Elmer Fudd from the property and an Elmer Fudd shows up, how do they know they have the right Elmer Fudd before they stick him in the facial database? My take is that they misused copyrighted images or were conducting some sort of surveillance of the firms in question in the first place in order to know who to ban from the property. There's a chicken and egg problem that doesn't go away even if every banned lawyer in question has been to the property before.
And it opens a new can of worms. Because now they're using surveillance video of people for a purpose other than the necessary. I think they're in trouble no matter what happens.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Wednesday February 01 2023, @06:15PM (4 children)
They could simply pore over all the info he gave them when he purchased a ticket.
Lol, nope. They might have violated privacy laws, but copyright is not a factor. And, no, I'm not entertaining the possibility that it is. Maybe we can revisit if MSG ever decides to sell their image database or make it public.
I'm not disputing they possibly broke the law in collecting the data they need, it's just not called 'piracy' or 'search'.
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(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday February 01 2023, @06:35PM (3 children)
Like? "Employer" seems like one of those categories that would be missing.
Or is required by a court or regulator order to reveal where they received those images from.
Except, of course, when it is such.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Wednesday February 01 2023, @06:47PM (2 children)
"Preferred Star Trek Series" is probably not one of those categories, either. Yet data mining still happens. Gee.
Not related to copyright.
In that case they might have jaywalked the images into their database. MSG would be relieved, that's just a fine... if NYC even enforces it.
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(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday February 01 2023, @07:16PM (1 child)
This is starting to sound like another one of those searches you say aren't searches.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Wednesday February 01 2023, @07:27PM
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