Facebook said it is shutting down the Face Recognition system on Facebook and people who’ve opted in will no longer be automatically recognized in photos and videos.

Meta (Formerly Facebook) said it will delete more than a billion people’s individual facial recognition templates.

This change will also impact Automatic Alt Text (AAT), which creates image descriptions for blind and visually-impaired people.

After this change, AAT descriptions will no longer include the names of people recognized in photos but will function normally otherwise.

META said it needs to weigh the positive use cases for facial recognition against growing societal concerns, especially as regulators have yet to provide clear rules.

This change will represent one of the largest shifts in facial recognition usage in the technology’s history.

More than a third of Facebook’s daily active users have opted in to the Face Recognition setting and are able to be recognized, and its removal will result in the deletion of more than a billion people’s individual facial recognition templates.

“Making this change required careful consideration, because we have seen a number of places where face recognition can be highly valued by people using platforms,” the company said.

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