Two Chicago residents are suing delivery-robot companies Coco Robotics and Serve Robotics, claiming the machines scanned their faces and hands without permission.
Both cases are class actions. The plaintiffs say robots arrived with their orders, from Coco via DoorDash and from Serve via Uber Eats, even though they had not asked for robot delivery in the app. When they opened the cargo bay to get their food, they allege, cameras and LiDAR (a laser-based sensor that maps surroundings) captured their hands and faces. The suits also claim the video and sensor data is retained and shared with AI companies for training.
If proven, that would breach the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act of 2008. The plaintiffs seek statutory damages of $1,000 per negligent violation or $5,000 per intentional or reckless one.
Both companies deny the allegations. Coco called the suit "frivolous". A Coco spokesperson said it "fundamentally misunderstands our technology, we have not collected biometric data in Chicago," and that "the data we share is navigational data used to make sidewalks safer for all users." Serve said it "does not use data to identify individuals or create biometric profiles."
Read closely, those denials leave gaps. Coco's statement covers biometric collection in Chicago and the data it shares, not everything its robots record or keep. Serve's covers identification and profiling, not retention or training. Serve's privacy policy ties retention periods to "contractual obligations with our delivery partners" and explicitly mentions sharing data "to train AI agents and models." Coco's policy was last updated in 2022, before it began operating in Chicago, and says little about retention.
A delivery robot cannot work without scanning the sidewalk, which is the heart of the defense. The legal question is narrower: whether what these machines captured at the cargo bay counts as biometric data, and whether anyone consented to it. It lands as scrutiny of Flock cameras, delivery drones and camera-equipped glasses grows.