The app is called Clearview is currently being used by law enforcement agencies in America, with plans to expand its uses to law enforcement agencies around the world.
Founded by Hoan Ton-That, the app allows people to take a picture of someone – perfect or imperfect – and then run it through the internet, searching through millions of websites for information about that person.
The company’s database boasts of more than 3 billion photos which the company claims to have gotten from YouTube, Venmo, Facebook, and several other sites which it tries to match with the photo, alongside links where the picture was posted.
The app isn’t public yet, but several law enforcement agencies are already using it, with one law enforcement officer attesting that he used it to solve a murder case in twenty minutes.
Law enforcement officers also said that they have used it to solve shoplifting, identity theft, credit card fraud, murder and child sexual exploitation cases.
It’s not just law enforcement agencies that are using the app, however. Clearview has also opened the app for use to some companies “for security purposes”.
NYTimes also found that, while this app could be very useful, it could also be very dangerous as the company has designed Augmented Reality technology which, when used in AR glasses could be very dangerous.
Although the app is not public yet, it can be dangerous for protestors in countries with unrest and for attractive people walking down the street.
According to one backer, Peter Thiel, he thinks the worst that could happen with the app is that it “can lead to a dystopian future or something”, but consequences could be far worse.
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