Metropolitan police officers are to start scanning citizens\u2019 faces using automated facial recognition technology to check their identities, in a move backed by the mayor of London but described as \u201calarming\u201d by opponents.<\/p>\n
The pilot was revealed on Thursday when Sadiq Khan<\/a> said 100 officers would use the roaming technology \u2013 commonly deployed on smartphones \u2013 for six months. The mayor was responding to questioning from an opposition politician amid rising concern about the rollout of AI-powered policing tools. The Met\u2019s website still states it \u201cdoes not presently use the so-called operator initiated facial recognition\u201d.<\/p>\n Face scanning has already been deployed by police with cameras on vans and in fixed locations including in Croydon, Manchester and South Wales. Retrospective facial recognition systems are also widely in use across the UK.<\/p>\n This week the Guardian revealed how police arrested a man for a burglary in a city 100 miles away that he had never visited<\/a> after software confused him with another person of south Asian heritage. It also emerged that the Met signed a \u00a3490,000 three-month contract with the controversial American AI firm Palantir<\/a> to try to detect rogue officers based on their wider conduct.<\/p>\n Zo\u00eb Garbett, the Green party London<\/a> Assembly member whose question triggered Khan\u2019s announcement, called the Met\u2019s latest tech pilot \u201can alarming change\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a new technique, and it really changes the relationship with the public,\u201d she told Khan during a meeting at City Hall on Thursday. \u201cThey\u2019re going to be able to literally walk up and scan people\u2019s faces on the device.\u201d<\/p>\n Khan denied this and said it would be used during police stops and when officers were not persuaded a member of the public had identified themselves correctly.<\/p>\n \u201cThe only alternative the police have is to arrest that person and take them to the police station,\u201d he said. \u201cSo one of the advantages of this device \u2026 is to avoid that huge inconvenience and to see if the person they are speaking to is somebody whose face matches with somebody whose face they\u2019ve got on the custody record.\u201d<\/p>\n The Metropolitan police deploying live facial recognition technology in Croydon, south London. Photograph: PA Images\/Alamy<\/p>\n The pilot emerged as the Equality and Human Rights Commission called for a new independent oversight body to regulate the use of facial recognition technology in the UK. Sarah Jones, the policing minister, has called the technology \u201cthe biggest breakthrough for catching criminals since DNA matching\u201d.<\/p>\n But the chair of the equalities watchdog, Mary-Ann Stephenson, said: \u201cThere is a danger that these technologies can be inaccurate and falsely identify people. The data shows that there are racial disparities for false positive identification, causing human rights infringements and distress to those affected. That is why a strong legal framework is needed.\u201d<\/p>\n Operator-initiated facial recognition is already in use by South Wales police, where officers run NEC\u2019s NeoFace algorithm on their smartphones. They can use it \u201cto confirm the identity of an unknown person who they suspect is missing, at imminent risk of serious harm or wanted, in circumstances when they\u2019re unable to provide details, refuse to give details or provide false details\u201d, the force says.<\/p>\n It can also be used to identify dead or unconscious people but cannot be used covertly. Another police definition<\/a> says it can be used if there is \u201cintelligence to suggest that they may pose a risk of harm to themselves or others\u201d. The civil liberties campaign group Big Brother Watch has described this as \u201cnebulous\u201d<\/a> and offering \u201cvast scope\u201d to use the technology in non-crime situations.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s shocking that I had to force the mayor to disclose that they are trailing operator-initiated facial recognition technology,\u201d said Garbett. \u201cWe already have no clear legal framework for live facial recognition and now it\u2019s being further expanded with handheld devices that allow officers to walk up and scan people\u2019s faces. In Britain, no one has to identify themselves to police without very good reason and this unregulated technology threatens that fundamental right.\u201d<\/p>\n