A coalition of Parliamentarians and human rights organisations have called on Frasers Group to end the use of facial recognition surveillance in their stores. In a letter to the retail group, owned by businessman Mike Ashley, signatories observed that live facial recognition (LFR) systems have “well-evidenced issues with privacy, inaccuracy, and race and gender discrimination”. The letter has been signed by nearly 50 parliamentarians and signatories include former Brexit Secretary David Davis, former Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell and Green MP Caroline Lucas.
The letter states that “LFR inverts the vital democratic principle of suspicion preceding surveillance and treats everyone who passes the camera like a potential criminal.” Live facial recognition works by obtaining facial biometric data – information as sensitive as a fingerprint – which is then compared to privately created watchlists. Signatories described Frasers Group use of LFR as “the equivalent of performing an identity check on every single customer.”
Big Brother Watch’s research has found that 87% of facial recognition “matches” in the Metropolitan Police’s trials of the surveillance technology in fact misidentified innocent people.1 Studies have also found that facial recognition on average misidentifies women and people of colour at higher rates than Caucasian people.2
Commenting, Mark Johnson, Legal and Policy Officer at Big Brother Watch said:
“This should be a wake-up call for Frasers Group. With over 40 parliamentarians from all parties and three major rights groups calling on Michael Murray and Mike Ashley to ditch live facial recognition cameras, it is vital that they listen and remove this rights-abusive technology from their stores.
“These systems work by adding customers to secret watchlists with no due process, meaning people can be blacklisted and denied the opportunity to enter shops despite being entirely innocent.
“Live facial recognition has no place on Britain’s high streets. Customers at Flannels, House of Fraser and Sports Direct stores should not expect to be treated like criminals when they go out to the shops.
Notes:
Please see the letter to Frasers Group by clicking here.
Spokespeople are available for interviews. Contact Big Brother Watch’s 24h media line on 07730439257 or email info@bigbrotherwatch.org.uk
(1) Calculated from Metropolitan Police Force statistics. Of 173 total matches, 150 were false positives and 23 were
true positives. See figures from each Metropolitan Police deployment of live facial recognition here