Noyb files five GDPR complaints accusing Scale AI of tracking its data-labeling freelancers
The complaints, filed in four countries, focus on the Outlier platform, which noyb says records clicks and keystrokes every few seconds.
The Austria-based privacy group noyb has filed five complaints under the EU's General Data Protection Regulation against Scale AI with authorities in France, Italy, the Netherlands and Austria. Noyb coordinated with French group Intérêt à Agir, privacy research lab DIPLab and analysis firm Reversing.Works. The complaints target Scale's Outlier platform, which recruits freelancers to produce AI training data used by companies including Google, Meta and OpenAI. Scale has worked with more than 900,000 people. Meta owns nearly half of Scale. Noyb alleges that the platform in some cases records freelancers' mouse clicks and keystrokes every few seconds, that the data can be used to build video of a worker's entire day, and that Scale illegally requires workers to submit biometric data. A noyb spokesperson said its analysis found 18 third-party trackers on French freelancers' data and that there are likely more. The collected data includes IP addresses, contact details and unique identifiers, and noyb says it can be used for targeted advertising. GDPR fines can reach €20 million or 4% of global annual revenue, whichever is higher. The case puts a spotlight on the working conditions of the large, mostly invisible workforce that produces training data for frontier AI models.