The concept of being opted-in by default and being forced to authenticate yourself to opt out is getting more and more ridiculous by the day.
These systems need to be opt-in, and that requirement needs to be enforced by some kind of powerful government agency with the power to arrest and jail non-compliant operators. Anything less feels like it would end up being a complete surrender to companies like Clearview AI.
To really flip the table, we need to make it mandatory to pay people for use of their data. If a company is exploiting[ß] someone else's property, the owner must be compensated for the privilege. Take a page from SaaS companies' nickel-and-diming ("pay per use") billing strategy, too. Just turn it around: forbid blanket permissions and consents.
The idea is to ensure that other people's data needs to be universally treated as a toxic liability, not an asset.
ß: in economic sense, although other meanings apply equally well.
So you're saying we should just surrender to companies like Clearview AI? I don't agree with your fatalism.
I think you're making a mistake in assuming that governments are unaccountable and cannot be prevented from pursuing interests that against those of the people. That's clearly not the case. If you were right, we'd already have unchecked police surveillance (isn't government is the consumer of surveillance products?), but we don't. That's only the case in non-democracies like China. In democracies, society (and the government itself) is capable of putting significant constraints on government action.
Privacy starts from us not revealing our private information. That's why we have curtains at home. It is us who put the curtains on windows.