Live Facial Recognition (LFR) technology was deployed for the first time on 11 March in the borough’s “crime hotspots”, according to Hackney Police.
LFR technology uses live camera feeds to compare the faces of people passing by to those on a watchlist, alerting police when matches are found.
“this technology will further enable racial profiling and the over-policing of already marginalised communities” – hACKNEY green party
A trial of LFR took place in Hackney last summer aimed at reassuring concerned councillors about the technology, but there is still strong cross-party opposition to its use.
The Hackney Independent Socialist Group told the Hackney Post that there was a “high risk of misidentifications, including disproportionality amongst community members from global majorities”.
“We do not believe our highly diverse borough is the best place to roll it out,” it added.
But the Hackney Green Party raised concerns that “this technology will further enable racial profiling and the over-policing of already marginalised communities”.
The issue came to a head in January when a Green Party motion passed, having received cross-party support to “not agree to the deployment of LFR in Hackney until the Council is satisfied it will not lead to a further erosion of trust in policing in Hackney”.
A Hackney Council spokesperson told the Hackney Post: “As a council, we don’t have the mandate to prevent the police from using such a technology. We work with local police to help ensure it is used appropriately.”
Hackney Police’s LFR policy document states that “the impact of deployment on the rights and freedoms of members of the public must be considered” before authorisation on a given occasion is granted.
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