Google constantly tries to link more and more features into its products and services-from new offerings. The introduction of the Ask Photos feature in Google Photos has brought excitement for reminisce users and those who would like to search their photos using artificial intelligence. But, to the dismay of many users, this feature is not functional in the states of Texas and Illinois. What is the cause of this?
What Is This Ask Photos Feature?
Ask Photos is the AI feature Photos that lets users ask natural language, voice- or text-based questions like, "Show me pictures from our beach trip in 2022," so that Google can then apply AI to return relevant photos from your collection.
But Why Is It that It Is Not Working in Texas and Illinois?
First concerns are the biometric privacy laws of these two states:
1. Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) – Illinois
To put it bluntly, BIPA makes consent mandatory. Individuals must provide their consent before any information can be collected or analyzed-facial recognitions, fingerprints, or eye scans. The Ask Photos feature used actual face recognition and AI analysis of images, so it found that it would just be safer to remove it from this use to avoid legal problems in Illinois.
2. Texas Privacy Law
Texas has a similar law: consent is to be granted before biometric-related information is collected or linked with a person's face or their eyes. This has made pull out the feature in Texas.
Google's stand
It would have the most part stating user privacy, complying with the local assimilations of laws, thereby restricting some features in some geographies.
The Ask Photos feature is very beneficial to the user; unfortunately, it cannot be accessed by users in Texas and Illinois due to legal limitations. Perhaps, due to changes in laws or a legal workaround found, the service might be rolled out there anytime.
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