Source: United Kingdom London Metropolitan Police
The Met heard concerns from people in Croydon about violence on their streets.
To address this officers are working on a range of operations to identify and deal with those responsible.
One of these tactics is the use of Live Facial Recognition (LFR) technology which was deployed in Croydon on Friday afternoon (19 January).
As part of the Met’s ongoing work to reduce serious violence in the Croydon area officers made five arrests using LFR.
The latest precise policing deployment lead to the arrest of:
- A 32-year-old woman for failing to appear at court for burglary.
- A 50-year-old man for failing to comply with his conditions as a Registered Sex Offender.
- A 34-year-old man for robbery – wanted by police.
- A 36-year-old wanted by the court for offences in relation to animal cruelty.
- A 31-year-old woman wanted for failing to appear at court for drink drive related offences.
LFR technology scans the faces of people passing through an area against a watchlist of people wanted by police and sets off an alert when a match is made. An officer will then review the match and decide if they wish to speak with the individual.
Lindsey Chiswick, responsible for LFR for the Met said: “As part of our commitment to building A New Met For London we are using this technology to identify harmful criminals. Trying to identify people who are wanted by the police is not new. LFR does what the police have always done but with much more accuracy, precision and far quicker. If there is no match, all biometric details are immediately destroyed.”
We communicate each LFR deployment in the local area before the technology is in operation and use local neighbourhood officers and leaflets to explain the benefits of the technology while it’s live.
More information about live facial recognition can be found here. (https://www.met.police.uk/advice/advice-and-information/fr/facial-recognition-technology/)
Throughout this week the Met will share how we are listening to local communities and working with others to respond.