Artificial intelligence firm Clarifai has confirmed it removed 3 million images from OkCupid and deleted facial-recognition models that had been trained on that dataset, actions the company said it completed after the U.S. Federal Trade Commission settled with the dating service over privacy concerns.
The settlement, reached in late March, addressed OkCupid's transfer of user photos and demographic information to Clarifai in 2014 for the purpose of training facial-recognition models. The deal between the FTC and OkCupid drew criticism from some Democrats who argued it did not go far enough to address the privacy breach.
According to a document seen by Reuters, Clarifai certified to the FTC on April 7 that it had deleted the images. The company also informed the office of U.S. Representative Lori Trahan on April 16 that it had removed any models trained on the data and had not shared the dataset with third parties, Trahan's office said.
Responses from lawmakers and regulators
Representative Trahan, a Democrat from Massachusetts, called the firm's confirmation "a step in the right direction," while criticizing the FTC for what she described as an inadequate settlement. In a statement quoted by Trahan's office she said: "Misconduct by AI companies should never go unnoticed or unanswered, and I’ll continue plugging gaps left by this partisan FTC to ensure Americans’ privacy and safety comes first."
The FTC pushed back on Democrats' criticism. An agency spokesperson, Joe Simonson, said: "This is a completely baseless issue manufactured by Democrats who do nothing but lie for a living." The FTC also stated it does not have the authority to issue penalties for the violations alleged in the case.
Clarifai's role and remaining uncertainties
Clarifai obtained the data after requesting it from OkCupid and was not accused of wrongdoing by the FTC. Company officials did not respond to requests for comment on details such as the number of models deleted beyond those trained on the OkCupid data or the length of time those models had been in use.
The Delaware-based company markets facial-recognition tools capable of identifying individuals in images and video and of analyzing attributes such as age, race and gender, according to material on its website. The company has worked with the U.S. military and received investments from Nvidia and other backers.
Court records indicate Clarifai's founder sought the OkCupid data in 2014 at a time when some OkCupid executives were investors in Clarifai. In an email to OkCupid co-founder Maxwell Krohn, Clarifai founder Matthew Zeiler wrote: "We’re collecting data now and just realized that OKCupid must have a HUGE amount of awesome data for this."
FTC findings and settlement terms
The FTC found the transfer of data breached OkCupid’s privacy policy and violated a federal law prohibiting deceptive business practices. As part of the settlement, OkCupid and its parent company Match Group agreed not to misrepresent how they handle user privacy in the future.
The agency launched its investigation after a New York Times article in 2019 that brought the data transfer to light.
Context and political implications
The episode has surfaced as AI policy becomes more politically salient. The issue was characterized in reporting as a flashpoint ahead of U.S. congressional elections, coinciding with an administration intent on advancing U.S. leadership in artificial intelligence. Beyond the immediate legal and compliance steps taken by Clarifai and OkCupid, the case has prompted debate over regulatory scope, corporate data practices, and protections for users whose images are used in model training.