Harrah’s Casino Faces Class Action Lawsuit

A lawsuit has been filed against Harrah’s Casino in Joliet for violating the state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act by possessing the facial geometry scans and identifying information of its Joliet casino customers “without creating and following a written policy, made available to the public.”

The lawsuit asks the judge to award liquidated or actual monetary damages, whichever is higher, to lawsuit co-plaintiffs Leon Martin and Anthony Adams and members of the class action lawsuit, “for each violation of the Biometric Information Privacy Act.”

Last year, Harrah’s downtown Joliet casino had gross receipts of nearly $178 million and admitted 1.29 million patrons, with an average daily admission of 3536 patrons, the lawsuit states. “Defendants use facial recognition technology with their video security cameras at their Illinois casinos,” the suit explains. “Defendants’ facial recognition technology identifies a person by scanning the geometry of a person’s facial features and comparing that scan against databases of stored facial geometry templates.”