Macy’s, Inc. filed a memorandum in support of their motion to dismiss the complaint brought against them as a result of an ongoing lawsuit between citizens and Clearview AI in the Northern District of Illinois on Monday.
The defendant attempted to separate themselves from Clearview AI, the facial recognition company at the center of the class action lawsuit, in which the plaintiffs alleged that Clearview “covertly scraped three billion photographs of facial images from the internet” and used this data to create a biometric database which was then sold to various government agencies and private entities, including Macy’s.
The defendant started their memorandum by stating “a dichotomy exists in the Complaint between the vast majority of allegations against Clearview, and the scarce references to Macy’s.” Doubling down, they claimed “not one allegation even remotely ties any Plaintiff to a Macy’s store.”
Macy’s noted that they did not “upload their photos, or cause them any type of harm whatsoever,” casting doubt on the plaintiffs’ Article III standing. Furthermore, they claimed that they did not “create any face-recognition technology” and that Biometric Information Privacy Act violations all resulted from “Clearview’s alleged scraping of photographs, not Macy’s actions.”
The defendant pointed out that injunctive relief was sought against Clearview for their database, and that Macy’s was simply “may have contracted with Clearview” and they “do not possess,and have never possessed, this [biometric] information.” Macy’s continued by saying that “the plaintiffs did not plead actual facts,” asserting that all charges against them should be dropped as they are minimally associated with Clearview, the main target of the lawsuit, at best.
The defendant asked the court to dismiss the complaint’s claims with prejudice, and to grant any other relief as deemed necessary.
Macy’s is represented by Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP.
