Rite Aid banned from using AI facial recognition

FILE PHOTO: A woman shops inside a Rite Aid store underneath a DeepCam security camera in New York City, New York, U.S., November 20, 2019. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bankrupt U.S. pharmacy chain Rite Aid will be prohibited from using facial recognition technology for surveillance purposes for five years to settle U.S. Federal Trade Commission charges it harmed consumers, the FTC said on Tuesday.

Rite Aid deployed artificial intelligence-based facial recognition technology from 2012 to 2020 in order to identify shoplifters but the company falsely flagged some consumers as matching someone who had previously been identified as a shoplifter, the FTC said.