Live facial recognition technology to be used in first Bath deployment
Law enforcement is deploying live facial recognition technology in Bath for the first time, marking the city's initial use of real-time biometric surveillance in a public setting.
Why this matters: Live facial recognition does not wait for a crime. It scans everyone who walks past, compares faces to a database, and flags matches in real time. Most people in Bath will have no idea it is happening. That is the point. The technology is spreading city by city, often with little public debate before it goes live. Once the cameras are up and the infrastructure exists, it tends to stay. Residents deserve to know what database their faces are being checked against, who set the rules, and what happens when the system gets it wrong.
Who should care: Privacy officers · Cybersecurity · General readers · Policy
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