Dear John,

We won! Today the Court of Appeal has said that South Wales Police’s use of facial recognition technology in public is unlawful.

The Court’s ruling will have major implications for police forces across the country and is a crucial step in our mission to get the privacy-abusing, discriminatory tech banned.

A world first

Our case with Ed Bridges is the world’s first legal challenge to police use of facial recognition. 

Ed was scanned by the tech – which ‘maps’ the faces of everyone in range of special cameras and ‘matches’ them to images on secretive watch lists. This happened while he was Christmas shopping, and again at a peaceful protest. 

Ed argued that snatching his personal biometric data (the unique measurements of his face) without his knowledge or consent violated his right to privacy. He also raised that the tech is discriminatory – it is known to misidentify people of colour, meaning they are more likely to be stopped by the police – and its use breaches data protection laws.

The Court agreed with our case, stating that it does indeed breach privacy rights, data protection laws and equality laws and South Wales Police must immediately halt its use of live facial recognition in public.

Now ban it

This is a major victory, but we can’t stop here. 

There has been much talk of Parliament creating laws to govern facial recognition’s use, but this can’t solve the privacy concerns or correct the tech’s in-built discrimination.

The only way to mend these problems is to ban it altogether. 

Several US cities have recognised this and have done just that. It’s time for us to follow.

Almost 50,000 people have already signed our petition calling for a ban. Sign it today and share it with friends and family.

Together we will get facial recognition off our streets.

Thank you for your support.

Martha Spurrier
Director

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