Precision equipment maker Omron Corp. used images of passengers surreptitiously taken at train stations run by East Japan Railway Co. for a government-linked research project without JR East's consent, the companies admitted Saturday.
The big data privacy incident is the second involving JR East, which admitted selling data on its Suica card customers to Hitachi Ltd. in July 2013 without notifying cardholders that it was doing so.
Omron's misuse of the images raises further suspicions about the way high-tech firms are treating people in the age of big data.