A pilot of live facial recognition technology in south London has helped reduce crime and led to more than 100 arrests, the Metropolitan Police said, as the force prepares to defend its use of the technology in the Supreme Court.
The three-month trial in Croydon, which began in October, was the first time the Met used fixed live facial recognition (LFR) cameras on street furniture instead of mobile vans. Fifteen cameras were installed on two sections of North End, one of the borough’s busiest shopping streets.
The Met said the system was used 13 times during the pilot, with the cameras only switched on when officers were present. There were 103 arrests during this period, with police reporting only one false alarm report, which did not lead to an arrest.
According to police, around a third of these arrests were related to crimes against women and girls, including sexual assault and strangulation. Other arrests included people wanted for kidnapping, violating sexual harassment prevention orders and long-standing assault cases.
Superintendent Luke Dillon said overall crime in the Fairfield district fell by 12 percent during the pilot period, with shoplifting and robberies dropping significantly. He added that the fixed camera setting allowed officers to work more efficiently, with arrests occurring on average every 34 minutes during operations.
The technology captures facial features and compares them with police watch lists. The Met said biometric data of people who are not wanted by police will be immediately deleted.
But the trial comes amid increasing scrutiny of police use of facial recognition. The force will face a High Court next week over its use of LFR after a man was wrongly identified and stopped near London Bridge last year. Civil liberties activists argue that the technology poses serious risks to privacy and lacks a clear legal framework.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission, which was given permission to intervene in the case, has said the Met’s current use of LFR breaches human rights laws. Police said they were confident the technology would be used lawfully and proportionately and insisted they had tested their algorithms for bias.
Despite LFR being described as a “game-changing” crime-fighting tool, the Met said there are currently no plans to expand the fixed camera pilot beyond Croydon.
Tony Kounnis, managing director of Face Int UK & Europe, said the results highlight the potential of facial recognition when used responsibly.
“This is a strong validation of what facial recognition technology can do with increasing accuracy,” he said. “But it is important that oversight, transparency and data protection remain central. Without this, there is a real risk that public trust will be undermined, whatever the benefits.”
