Clarifai deletes 3 million photos that OkCupid provided to train facial recognition AI, report says

Source: TechCrunch

The AI platform Clarifai deleted 3 million photos that it says it received from OkCupid to train its facial‑recognition AI, and it also removed any models that were trained using that data【Reuters】(https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/ai-company-deleted-okcupid-user-photos-data-after-ftc-scrutiny-2026-04-20/).

Background

• In 2014, Clarifai asked OkCupid—whose executives had invested in the company—to share data.
• OkCupid provided user‑uploaded photos along with demographic and location information, as reported by The Next Web【source】(https://thenextweb.com/news/clarifai-okcupid-photos-deleted-ftc-settlement).
• According to OkCupid’s own privacy policies, this behavior should have been prohibited.

An email from Clarifai founder and CEO Matthew Zeiler to OkCupid co‑founder Maxwell Krohn, cited in court documents reviewed by Reuters, read:

“We’re ⁠collecting data now and just realized that OKCupid must have a HUGE amount of awesome data for this.”

FTC Investigation

• Although the data sharing occurred twelve years ago, the FTC did not open an investigation until 2019, after a New York Times article highlighted Clarifai’s use of OkCupid images to build an AI tool that could estimate age, sex, and race from a face【source】(https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/13/technology/databases-faces-facial-recognition-technology.html).
• The FTC alleged that, since 2014, Match Group and OkCupid deliberately concealed the data sharing and attempted to obstruct the investigation.

Settlement

• The FTC and OkCupid (owned by Match Group) settled the lawsuit last month【FTC press release】(https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2026/03/ftc-takes-action-against-match-okcupid-deceiving-users-sharing-personal-data-third-party).
• OkCupid and Match Group did not admit to the allegations, but Clarifai’s confirmation that it deleted the data implies that the photos were indeed accessed.
• The FTC cannot fine companies for this first‑time offense, but it declared that OkCupid and Match are “permanently prohibited from misrepresenting or assisting others in misrepresenting” the nature of their data collection and sharing【FTC statement】(https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2026/03/ftc-takes-action-against-match-okcupid-deceiving-users-sharing-personal-data-third-party).

OkCupid and Clarifai did not immediately respond to requests for comment.