There is no clear legal basis for the police to expand their use of Live Facial Recognition (LFR) technology, a select committee of peers said.
Baroness Hamwee, chair of the Justice and Home Affairs Committee, wrote to Home Secretary James Cleverly on Jan. 26, calling for a legislative framework on LFR deployment.
“The Committee accepts that LFR may be a valuable tool for police forces, but we are deeply concerned that its use is being expanded without proper scrutiny and accountability,” Baroness Hamwee said.
LFR has been trialed by the Metropolitan police since 2016. Last month, the committee was told that only two forces—the Met and South Wales Police (SWP)—had contracts to have access to the technology, but SWP loaned the equipment to the Northamptonshire Police during the Silverstone Formula 1 weekend.
Lindsey Chiswick, director of intelligence at the Met, defended the inclusion of shoplifters in the watchlist during the force’s Oxford Street deployment, telling peers that shops are “desperate” to catch them. She also said the Met would consult local businesses before creating lists.
According to Ms. Chiswick and Mark Travis, temporary deputy chief constable and senior responsible officer for facial recognition technology at SWP, LFR cameras would scan tens of thousands of faces of the public, compare them against the watchlist, and delete those which didn’t match immediately. Police officers at the scene would then decide on what actions to take, and the watchlist is dismantled after deployment.
Baroness Hamwee told the home secretary that the committee is concerned about the lack of standard definition of “serious crime” for all forces.
Citing examples of previous deployment by the Met, SWP, and the Northamptonshire Police, she said, “ We are concerned by the fact that watchlists include people who ‘have an intent’ or are thought to ’threaten' to commit a crime.
“Such evaluation is most sensitive. What precisely does it mean? Should the approval of watchlists be carried out by a third independent party, outside the police force itself?”
The baroness said the committee also recommended that the watchlists “should be subject to specific compulsory statutory criteria and standardised training.”
The committee disputed claims that there is a sound legal basis for expanding the use of LFR.
Policing minister Chris Philp also told police chiefs that there was “a sound legal basis for LFR” in a letter sent in October last year.
However, the committee disagrees, noting that the judgment “expressed concerns about the ‘fundamental deficiencies’ in the current legal framework.”
“We are concerned that the findings of the Bridges case were specific to that case and that the case cannot be understood as a clear basis for the use of LFR. Whatever the practice, it requires a firm foundation in primary legislation,” Baroness Hamwee wrote.
Privacy campaigners and politicians have previously called for police to stop using facial scanning technology, citing concerns over human rights and the potential for discrimination.
Civil liberties group Big Brother Watch has branded the tool “Orwellian” and suggested that any widening of its use would lack a clear democratic mandate.
But the government last year announced it was considering expanding its use of surveillance across forces and security agencies.
The Home Office argues that the technology frees up officers to spend more time out on the beat and working on complex investigations.
A government spokesperson said: “Facial recognition, including live facial recognition, is a powerful tool that has a sound legal basis, confirmed by the courts. It has already helped the police to catch a large number of serious criminals, including for murder and sexual offences.
“The police can only use facial recognition for a policing purpose, where necessary, proportionate and fair, in line with data protection and human rights laws.”
The National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) said it welcomed the committee’s scrutiny and would consider its recommendations, but that LFR is always used “proportionately and transparently.”
Individual chief constables are also held to account by their police and crime commissioners and mayors who examine operational decisions on LFR, the council added.
Ms. Chiswick, who is also NPCC’s lead for facial recognition, said: “The High Court and the Court of Appeal have previously recognised the existing legal basis for the police to use [LFR] technology—namely under common law in the UK.
“LFR is a tool which helps police to identify wanted individuals and it is always used proportionately and transparently, with communities told when it will be deployed,” she said.
