‘Creepy technology’: Zoom reportedly may develop AI tool that detects user emotions on video calls. Human rights groups call it invasion of privacy.

Video-conferencing outfit Zoom reportedly may develop an artificial intelligence tool that detects users’ emotions by scanning facial expressions and examining vocal tones — but human rights groups are saying such technology would be invasion of privacy, the Thomson Reuters Foundation reported.

The outlet said tech publication Protocol reported on the subject last month.

But more than 25 groups — including Access Now, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the Muslim Justice League — on Wednesday sent a joint letter to Zoom chief executive Eric Yuan against the idea, the Thomson Reuters Foundation said.

“If Zoom advances with these plans, this feature will discriminate against people of certain ethnicities and people with disabilities, hardcoding stereotypes into millions of devices,” Caitlin Seeley George — director of campaign and operations at Fight for the Future, a digital rights group — said, according to TRF. “Beyond mining users for profit and allowing businesses to capitalize on them, this technology could take on far more sinister and punitive uses.”- READ MORE