Facebook Inc announced Tuesday that it is pulling the plug on its facial recognition system, which automatically identifies users in photos and videos, amid growing concerns about the use of such technology.

"Regulators are still in the process of providing a clear set of rules governing its use," Jerome Pesenti, vice president of artificial intelligence at Facebook, wrote in a blog post. "Amid this ongoing uncertainty, we believe that limiting the use of facial recognition to a narrow set of use cases is appropriate."

Facebook was one of the first companies to deploy face recognition at scale. Today @meta is announcing that it is turning it off. #ResponsibleAI is often deciding when to use, or in this case, not to use, AI. https://t.co/bPiUCpIT8G

— Jerome Pesenti (@an_open_mind) November 2, 2021

The removal of the feature comes after the tech industry faced a reckoning over the past few years over the ethics of using the technology. Critics say facial recognition technology could compromise privacy, target marginalized groups, and normalize intrusive surveillance. 

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The news also comes as Facebook has been under intense scrutiny from regulators and lawmakers over user safety and a wide range of abuses on its platforms.

The company, which recently rebranded itself as Meta Platforms Inc, said more than one-third of Facebook's daily active users have opted into the face recognition setting on the social media site, and the change will now delete the "facial recognition templates" of more than 1 billion people.

The removal will roll out globally and is expected to be complete by December, a Facebook spokesperson said.

Privacy advocacy and digital rights groups welcomed the move.

Facebook added that its automatic alt-text tool, which creates image descriptions for visually impaired people, will no longer include the names of people recognized in photos after the removal of face recognition, but will otherwise function normally.

Facebook did not rule out using facial recognition technology in other products, saying it still sees it as a "powerful tool" for identity verification, for example.