Getty Images Civil society: Police facial recognition must be strictly limited Digital rights groups map out ‘minimum, necessary’ human rights protections to be included in UK government’s upcoming legal framework for police facial recognition Police facial recognition use in the UK must be limited to “strictly necessary and proportionate” cases to protect people’s collective and individual rights, says civil society coalition. Initially announced by then-home secretary Yvette Cooper in July 2025, the UK government is set to establish a specific legal framework for police facial recognition, which the King’s Speech in May 2026 confirmed would be contained within the upcoming Police Reform Bill. According to the King’s Speech, the framework will make clear “when use of these technologies can be justified” and includes the “creation of a single, expert regulatory body to provide independent advice and oversight”. Responding to the announcements, 12 digital rights groups – including Big Brother Watch, Liberty, Justice, the End Violence Against Women Coalition and the Open Rights Group – have signed a joint statement mapping out the “minimum, necessary protections” needed to ensure police facial recognition does not trample over key human rights. This includes protections against both live facial recognition (LFR), which acts like a biometric checkpoint by scanning the faces of passers-by in real time, and retrospective facial recognition (RFR), which is used by police to analyse recorded footage. Both are matched against a watchlist to identify individuals of interest to the police. The joint statement outlined the “minimum, necessary protections” needed to protect human rights, and urged the Home Office to prohibit the use of LFR except for “strictly defined policing purposes”. This includes where there is a threat to life, reasonable grounds to believe the person has committed a serious criminal offence, and in the targeted search for missing persons and