Microsoft Restricts Facial Recognition AI API Due To Responsible Use Concerns
Facial recognition services provided by Microsoft are seeing restrictions, as well as certain aspects being retired completely.
Created on July 5|Last edited on July 5
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Microsoft has put out a couple statements regarding a reassessment of responsible use of their AI services provided through Microsoft Azure, with a particular focus on their Face API.
In a more general blog post they describe changes to how they view AI and the responsible use of it with a new publicly available document outlining their updated standards. Specific changes and observations directed at a variety of their own AI-related products and services are also included in the blog post.
Facial recognition AI is one of the focused-on sections, and earned itself a blog post of its own. The Microsoft Azure Face API is seeing some massive restrictions on who gets to use certain aspects of it, particularly in areas that their new AI responsibility standard deems potentially harmful.
What's changing in the Microsoft Azure Face API?
Facial detection capabilities are still generally as available as they always have been, but facial recognition capabilities will now be restricted. Facial detection refers to things like facial bounding boxes or head pose, while facial recognition refers to services that identify people individually.
To ensure they are used responsibly, Microsoft has opted to restrict the use of facial recognition services behind an application process. New customers wanting to use facial recognition must apply for access, while existing customers may continue to use the service until June 30th 2023 when their access will be terminated unless they have submitted an application for further use.
Certain aspects of the facial recognition service are being retired completely and will not be supported in general-purpose systems by anybody, though in specific accessibility scenarios they may still get used, such as with Seeing AI for people with vision impairment. The retired aspects include recognition of "emotional states, gender, age, smile, facial hair, hair, and makeup."
If you're already a customer using these retired aspects of the Face API, you have until June 30th 2023 to discontinue the use of any services which are being retired. New customers will not be able to get access to the retired features.
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