A coalition of privacy and civil rights organizations is calling on Nottinghamshire Police to halt its planned use of live facial recognition technology, warning that its deployment could subject people in public spaces to widespread biometric surveillance.
The coalition includes groups working in human rights, racial justice, children’s rights, privacy, and civil liberties. In a joint letter, they argue that live facial recognition (LFR) should not be treated as a routine policing tool because cameras can scan the faces of large numbers of people who are not suspected of committing any crime.
Their concerns extend beyond the collection of biometric information. The organizations argue that routinely encountering facial recognition in public could affect how freely people participate in everyday activities, including attending demonstrations, communicating with journalists, seeking legal or medical assistance, or expressing aspects of their identity.
Particular criticism has been directed at the possibility of using the technology in response to relatively minor offenses and anti-social behavior involving young people. The coalition considers such deployments disproportionate and warns that increased surveillance could further damage relationships between young people and law enforcement.
The groups are asking Nottinghamshire Police to refrain from deploying LFR at least until a dedicated legal framework governing the technology is established.
Nottinghamshire Police announced its plans in July, saying facial recognition would help officers locate wanted individuals and identify vulnerable people included on police watchlists. Cameras compare faces captured in public against images contained on a predetermined list and alert officers when the system identifies a potential match.
According to the force, facial scans that do not produce a match are deleted within seconds. Police also maintain that the system is not designed to continuously track people’s movements and will support rather than replace officers.
Detective Superintendent Will Henley defended the technology as another way for police to identify offenders and protect members of the public. He argued that the force should make use of technology capable of helping officers find individuals considered responsible for serious harm.
The dispute reflects fundamentally different views of LFR deployment. Nottinghamshire Police presents it as a targeted identification tool operating against specific watchlists, while its opponents argue that the process necessarily involves scanning everyone who passes through the cameras’ field of view.
For the coalition, that distinction is central to its opposition: people do not have to be suspected of an offense for their faces to be processed during an LFR deployment.