Uber faces lawsuit against racially discriminatory facial recognition system in the UK

The drivers’ union App Drivers & Couriers Union (ADCU) has filed a lawsuit against Uber over a fair dismissal of a driver after the company’s facial recognition system failed to identify them. In the UK, Uber uses a facial recognition system developed by Microsoft. Drivers are required to take a real-time selfie when starting working. The selfie matches a stored reference photo. The ADCU argued that drivers were unfairly dismissed because the system failed to identify some drivers. The Union alleges that the system generates poor accuracy results when used with people of colour and the policy is, therefore, discriminatory.