Amazon Illegally Sold Facial Recognition to Russia, Claims Former Employee

An ex-employee of Amazon Web Services (AWS), Charles Forrest, has accused the company of violating UK sanctions by providing facial recognition technology to Russia following its invasion of Ukraine. Forrest presented this allegation during a preliminary hearing at a central London employment tribunal.

He claims he was unfairly dismissed by AWS after he raised concerns about several issues from November 2022 to May 2023, including the alleged illegal supply of technology to the Russian state security services.

Amazon has denied the allegations, stating that Forrest was dismissed for “gross misconduct” due to his failure to work his contractual hours and attend or respond to meetings and emails. The company denies Forrest’s allegation that it sold its Rekognition facial recognition technology to the Russian company VisionLabs, which Forrest claimed had access to the technology through a shell company in the Netherlands. An Amazon spokesperson stated, “We believe the claims lack merit and look forward to demonstrating that through the legal process.”

Forrest also reported the alleged illegal activity to the UK’s House of Commons defence select committee and Serious Fraud Office in May 2023. He further alleged that Amazon had broken its self-imposed moratorium on allowing police forces to use its facial recognition technology, a ban put in place following the killing of George Floyd in the United States. According to Forrest, UK police continued to use the technology for processing mugshots and identifying offenders, despite the ban.

Amazon refuted these additional claims, noting that a self-imposed moratorium does not constitute a legal obligation. In tribunal documents, Amazon stated that it was difficult to determine the details of the disclosures Forrest allegedly made. This includes identifying the legal obligations or failures he referred to and understanding to whom these disclosures were reported. Amazon also denied that Forrest had a reasonable belief that the company violated international sanctions.

Launched in 2016, Rekognition is a cloud-based image and video analysis service that uses deep learning technology to identify objects, people, text, scenes, and activities, as well as detect inappropriate content. Initially developed for a broad range of applications, Rekognition quickly gained attention for its use in security and law enforcement. It has also faced significant scrutiny over privacy concerns and potential biases in its facial recognition technology.

Source: The Financial Times

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June 7, 2024 – by Cass Kennedy