The Standard View: The Met's use of facial recognition technology fights crime and raises hackles

Facial recognition technology — indeed any form of artificial intelligence — has a habit of raising hackles. Its use by police, even to prevent crime and protect people from harm, is no different. But should it be?

The Standard reveals today that the Met used the technology at a Premier League football match for the first time. And it worked. Three people were arrested and charged after being caught on camera by surveillance vans, after they had their faces scanned on their way to watch Arsenal v Tottenham last month.

The Met says that facial recognition is not a ubiquitous tool that uses lots of CCTV to track every person’s movement — though that is something of a low bar. Instead, it calls it a “carefully deployed overt policing tactic to help locate a limited number of people”. Still, the Home Office has also announced plans to build a mass facial recognition database from passport photos.

Catching criminals and protecting the law-abiding majority is the bread and butter of policing, and new technology has always helped in that regard. Yet it is not difficult to imagine something more nefarious about its usage, should it either fall into the hands of the wrong people or a government with less benign intentions.

As for the match itself, it ended 2-2, with neither team’s defence able to be formally identified.

Some good news may be coming down the track for Tube passengers: Aslef has recommended its members accept a pay deal from Transport for London. After months of on-and-off industrial action, there is a possibility of a return to something akin to normality. T

his will be a welcome development for businesses in the capital reliant on footfall, which have suffered so badly first from Covid lockdowns and more recently from industrial action hitting commuters. The unions — including the RMT — should accept the deal and get back to work.

The pile of papers detailing plans to reimagine Liverpool Street Station are almost as high as the proposed tower itself. Some 455 documents detailing how the grade II listed station building has been redesigned were greeted with horror by conservation groups.

Perhaps the most controversial aspect is a 20-storey tower, something John Darlington, director of projects at World Monuments Fund Britain, compares to “putting two massive sumo wrestlers on top of this historic building”.

Clearly the developers have some way to go to convince locals and commuters alike that this is the best future for a historic building in the heart of the City.