Writing in NLJ this week, Nicholas Dobson says judges concluded the policy was both ‘in accordance with the law’ and sufficiently foreseeable under the European Convention on Human Rights.
The challenge arose after a Black community volunteer was wrongly identified by facial recognition software while his brother was under investigation. Campaigners argued the system gave police overly broad discretion and risked discriminatory deployment in ethnic minority areas. However, the court held that operational decisions were guided by specialist policing judgment rather than the ‘whim or caprice’ of officers.
Dobson notes the judges accepted live facial recognition was not physically ‘intrusive’ in the same sense as fingerprints or DNA collection. The ruling is likely to strengthen police confidence in expanding the technology across London hotspots and public events.
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