Disproportionate policing

Responding to the announcement, local councillors and human rights groups have voiced concerns that the Met’s decision to place permanent LFR cameras in Croydon – as well as its use of the technology generally – is disproportionate and contributing to the ongoing over-policing of certain communities.

Using fixed cameras is the logical next step in the roll-out of [LFR] technology, which will ensure even more wanted criminals get caught

According to data gathered by Green Party London Assembly member Zoë Garbett, who is actively campaigning against the pilot, LFR has been used on more than 30 occasions in Croydon since the start of 2024.

During this time, figures show that while more than 128,000 people’s faces were scanned, just 133 arrests were made.

On the wider use of LFR throughout London, Garbett said that over half of the 180 deployments that took place during 2024 were in areas where the proportion of Black residents is higher than the city’s average, including Lewisham and Haringey.

While Black people comprise 13.5% of London’s total population, the proportion is much higher in the Met’s deployment areas, with Black people making up 36% of the Haringey population, 34% of the Lewisham population, and 40.1% of the Croydon population.

“The Met’s decision to roll out facial recognition in areas of London with higher Black populations reinforces the troubling assumption that certain communities … are more likely to be criminals,” she said, adding while nearly two million people in total had their faces scanned across the Met’s 2024 deployments, only 804 arrests were made – a rate of just 0.04%.

“Facial recognition subjects everyone to constant surveillance, which goes against the democratic principle that you shouldn’t be monitored unless there’s a suspicion of wrongdoing,” she said.

“The Met claims live facial recognition has been a success in London, but how is treating millions of Londoners as suspects to be considered a success? The arrest figures are low, and it’s really just subjecting us to surveillance without our knowledge.”

Writing in City AM, interim director at privacy group Big Brother Watch Rebecca Vincent said the move to deploy permanent LFR cameras in Croydon “represents an alarming expansion of the surveillance state, and a further slide towards a dystopian nightmare that could quickly take hold across the UK”.

She added that the roll-out also underscores the urgent need for legislative safeguards on LFR, which to date has not been addressed in any Parliamentary legislation: “Police forces have been left to write their own policies on how they plan to use LFR, and can choose how and when to employ it. For its part, the Met’s ‘LFR watchlist’ expands beyond those suspected of criminal activity, including vulnerable persons and even victims of crimes.”

Facial recognition subjects everyone to constant surveillance, which goes against the democratic principle that you shouldn’t be monitored unless there’s a suspicion of wrongdoing

Computer Weekly contacted the Met about the concerns raised.

“The Met is committed to making London safer, using data and technology to identify offenders that pose a risk to our communities,” said a spokesperson for the force. “Last year we made over 500 arrests using LFR – removing dangerous individuals who were suspected of serious offences, including strangulation, stalking, domestic abuse and rape.

“Each deployment is based on intelligence, and we continue to engage with our communities to build understanding about how this technology works, providing reassurances that there are rigorous checks and balances in place to protect people’s rights and privacy.”

Computer Weekly specifically asked whether the force believes its use of the technology is proportionate, given the huge disparity between the number of faces scanned and the number of arrests, but received no response on this point.

The spokesperson did, however, challenge the “permanent” characterisation, adding that the use of LFR on street furniture in Croydon is a temporary pilot, and that the cameras are not fixed.

They further added the Met has implemented robust safeguards in its use of LFR, such as people’s biometrics being immediately deleted if they are scanned but not wanted by police.

They also said the system is exactly the same as that used in van deployments, but with the cameras on street furniture instead, and that each LFR deployment is based on an intelligence-led assessment of threat, harm and risk.

In December 2023, senior police officers confirmed to a House of Lords committee that facial recognition watchlist image selection is based on crime categories attached to people’s photos, rather than a context-specific assessment of the threat presented by a given individual.

A lack of community engagement

In response to the Met’s announcement, the Sutton and Croydon Green Party has joined with human rights group Liberty in calling for the nationwide halt of LFR deployments.

“There are no laws regarding live facial recognition, which means there are no safeguards to its use by law enforcement,” it said in a blog post, which also encouraged people to sign a petition created by Liberty opposing the use of LFR by UK police.

“To Croydon residents, live facial recognition represents a gross invasion of privacy, to which we’ve had no formal opportunity to object.”

To Croydon residents, live facial recognition represents a gross invasion of privacy, to which we’ve had no formal opportunity to object

Croydon councillor Ria Patel told Inside Croydon: “There has been no discussion of installing these cameras at Croydon Council and residents have been given no say whatsoever. We have not given our consent, and these plans must be stopped immediately.”

According to meeting minutes of Croydon Council’s Scrutiny and Overview Committee – which is responsible for matters concerning crime and policing – LFR has only been referenced once in 2025.

“Croydon continues to use this tactic to precisely target wanted offenders. To date, since inception in December 2023, over 200 arrests have been made as a direct result of this technology,” said the committee in its ‘community safety partnership annual review’, which was published on 25 March 2025.

“This ensures a more efficient use of police officer time and seeks to improve public confidence through highly visible community crime fighting. In 2025, we will be seeking to evolve how this technology is used to build on the success seen to date.”

Prior to this, the last time LFR was mentioned by the committee was during a meeting held in April 2024.

A Met spokesperson said while the force will always engage with councils, business leaders and local community members, it is operationally independent, like all police forces.

A pattern of ignoring local communities

The Met Police’s roll-out of LFR in other boroughs has similarly taken place with little to no community engagement, and in some areas has occurred despite notable political opposition from local authorities.

In December 2024, for example, community consultation documents obtained by Computer Weekly under Freedom of Information (FoI) rules revealed that – contrary to the Met’s claim that its LFR deployments in Lewisham are “supported by the majority of residents” – there has been little to no engagement with local residents.

While the documents did show there was engagement with local councillors, the councillors themselves told Computer Weekly this engagement was very limited. They also expressed concern over both the force’s use of the technology and its characterisation of Lewisham deployments as having “wide” public support.

Speaking with Computer Weekly in the wake of the Croydon announcement, Green Lewisham councillor Hau-Yu Tam highlighted how information around LFR deployments has been poorly communicated by the force, with deployments continuing against the express wishes of councillors, residents and advocates.

“For example, on Lewisham’s Safer Neighbourhood Board, which I sat on when LFR was being introduced to Lewisham for the first time, most of us expressed the strong view that LFR would re-traumatise racialised people,” she said.

Commenting on the Met’s decision to deploy permanent LFR in Croydon, Lewisham Labour councillor Liam Shrivastava – who is also chair of the borough’s Safer Stronger Communities Select Committee that is responsible for scrutinising police activity in the area – said on X that placing cameras on street furniture in town centres is deeply unsettling, and shifts LFR deployments from “overt” to “covert” surveillance of local communities.

“The fact that the Met has chosen to roll out these cameras in the borough with the biggest Black population in London is at odds with its Race Action Plan and will not improve outcomes for Black Londoners,” he wrote. “With the largest Black Caribbean community in London, Lewisham residents will rightly be concerned that their borough will be the next subjected to a permanent assault on their rights and privacy without their consent.”

Other councils have also passed motions rejecting the Met’s use of LFR in their local area, but to no avail. For example, while a LFR moratorium was brought by Haringey in March 2020, and a motion to suspend use of the technology in Newham was passed unanimously in January 2023 – at least until biometric and anti-discrimination safeguards are in place – the Met has elected to continue with its deployments in these areas.

“Police do not care about policing by consent, they will enforce on our communities in the name of ‘safety’ whether we like it or not,” said Tam, adding that many informed advocates and residents she has spoken with are “disturbed” by the news of permanent LFR in Croydon: “I am furious with any politician and public servant who is giving police forces carte blanche to expand their spying on our neighbourhoods.”

She added that installing LFR permanently is “dangerous for our communities” as “it normalises surveillance, re-entrenches community divisions and – due to its opacity and lack of legal safeguards – is wide open to being abused by officers.”

Although the Home Office and policing bodies have repeatedly claimed that police use of biometrics is covered by “comprehensive legal framework”, there have also been repeated calls from Parliament and civil society for new legal frameworks to explicitly govern law enforcement’s use of facial recognition technology. 

These include three separate inquiries by the Lords Justice and Home Affairs Committee (JHAC) into shoplifting, police algorithms and police facial recognition; an independent legal review by Matthew Ryder QC; the UK’s Equalities and Human Rights Commission; and the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, which called for a moratorium on LFR as far back as July 2019.

Meanwhile, a report from the outgoing biometrics commissioner for England and Wales noted in December 2024 that millions of unlawfully retained custody images could still be used for facial recognition purposes by UK police.

The National Police Chief’s Council (NPCC) previously confirmed to Computer Weekly in November 2023 that a national programme between policing and the Home Office had been launched a month before to ensure consistency and coordination across how police retain, process and use custody images, particularly for facial recognition purposes.

Commenting on the NPCC-Home Office custody image programme, the biometrics commissioner noted in his report that while work is “underway” to ensure the retention of images is proportionate and lawful, “the use of these custody images of unconvicted individuals may include for facial recognition purposes” in the meantime.