Facial recognition use by South Wales Police ‘unlawful’

The use of automated facial recognition (AFR) expertise by South Wales Police is illegal, the Court docket of Enchantment has dominated.

It follows a authorized problem introduced by civil rights group Liberty and Ed Bridges, 37, from Cardiff.

Mr Bridges mentioned being recognized by AFR had triggered him misery.

However the court docket additionally discovered its use was proportionate interference with human rights as the advantages outweighed the impression on Mr Bridges.

The court docket upheld three of the 5 factors raised within the enchantment.

It mentioned there was no clear steering on the place AFR Find might be used and who might be placed on a watchlist, a knowledge safety impression evaluation was poor and the drive didn’t take affordable steps to search out out if the software program had a racial or gender bias.

The enchantment adopted the dismissal of Mr Bridges’ case at London’s Excessive Court docket in September by two senior judges, who had concluded use of the expertise was not illegal.

‘Delighted’

Responding to Tuesday’s ruling, Mr Bridges mentioned: “I am delighted that the court docket has agreed that facial recognition clearly threatens our rights.

“This expertise is an intrusive and discriminatory mass surveillance instrument.

“For 3 years now, South Wales Police has been utilizing it towards a whole lot of hundreds of us, with out our consent and sometimes with out our data.

“We must always all be capable to use our public areas with out being subjected to oppressive surveillance.”

Mr Bridges’ face was scanned whereas he was Christmas procuring in Cardiff in 2017 and at a peaceable anti-arms protest exterior the town’s Motorpoint Area in 2018.

He had argued it it breached his human rights when his biometric knowledge was analysed with out his data or consent.

Liberty lawyer Megan Goulding described the judgment as a “main victory within the battle towards discriminatory and oppressive facial recognition”.

She added: “It’s time for the federal government to recognise the intense risks of this intrusive expertise. Facial recognition is a menace to our freedom – it has no place on our streets.”

The drive had confirmed Mr Bridges was not an individual of curiosity and had by no means been on a watch listing.

The expertise maps faces in a crowd by measuring the gap between options, then compares outcomes with a “watch listing” of pictures – which might embrace suspects, lacking individuals and individuals of curiosity.

South Wales Police has been trialling this type of AFR since 2017, predominantly at large sporting fixtures, concert events and different giant occasions throughout the drive space.

The drive had confirmed Mr Bridges was not an individual of curiosity and had by no means been on a watch listing.

Throughout the distant listening to final month, Liberty’s barrister Dan Squires QC argued that if everybody was stopped and requested for his or her private knowledge on the way in which right into a stadium, individuals would really feel uncomfortable.

“In the event that they had been to do that with fingerprints, it could be illegal, however by doing this with AFR there are not any authorized constraints,” he mentioned, as there are clear legal guidelines and steering on taking fingerprints.

Mr Squires mentioned it was the potential use of the ability, not its precise use up to now, that was the problem.

“It is not sufficient that it has been executed in a proportionate method thus far,” he mentioned.

He argued there have been inadequate safeguards inside the present legal guidelines to guard individuals from an arbitrary use of the expertise, or to make sure its use is proportional.