Reverse-lookup service exposed millions of photos of people’s faces
Summary
Ars Technica reports that the reverse-lookup tool ClarityCheck left a publicly accessible database containing more than 9 million image files, including faces of adults, teens, and children, stored in an unsecured Amazon S3 bucket and exposed via URLs in the site’s code. Independent researcher Jeremiah Fowler and WIRED highlight privacy and security concerns, noting misconfigured APIs could reveal emails and phone numbers. The piece discusses biometric data risks, potential for misuse in AI training, and calls for stronger security practices and regulatory oversight.