Breaking News Metropolitan Police is accelerating the use of live facial recognition technology across London, arguing the system has become a “groundbreaking” policing tool, even as civil liberties groups warn it risks normalising mass biometric surveillance in public spaces. The debate has intensified following a recent High Court ruling that cleared the way for wider deployment of the technology after a legal challenge brought by campaign group Big Brother Watch failed last month. During a recent deployment in Victoria, central London, police used temporary facial recognition cameras to scan passers-by against a watchlist of roughly 17,000 individuals compiled primarily from custody images. Within a short period, officers stopped multiple individuals after the system generated alerts, including one man later taken into custody. The Metropolitan Police says live facial recognition, or LFR, has helped officers arrest around 2,500 wanted individuals since the start of 2024, including suspects linked to violent and sexual offences. Lindsey Chiswick, who leads the force’s live facial recognition programme, described the technology as transformative for policing in the capital. Speaking during the Victoria operation, she cited cases involving robbery, rape, strangulation and convicted sex offenders identified through the system. The technology works by converting faces captured through live video feeds into biometric templates and comparing them in real time against police watchlists. According to the Met, non-matching facial data is deleted immediately after processing. Police say the system has demonstrated high levels of accuracy. Chiswick said that among more than 3 million faces scanned in the 12 months through last September, the technology generated only 10 false alerts, none of which resulted in arrests. But critics argue the core issue extends beyond technical accuracy to broader questions around civil liberties, privacy, and state surveillance. Campaigners say live facial recognition effectively treats every member of the public as