A press conference being used by police to spruik new crime-busting cameras has been interrupted when the technology detected several wanted people. A woman who allegedly failed to appear in court was among three people picked up by the real-time facial recognition cameras at the Mirrabooka bus station in Perth’s north on Thursday afternoon, forcing officers into action. WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Arrests made as new cameras spark police into action Know the news with the 7NEWS app: Download today “Been happening all week,” WA Police Commissioner Col Blanch said. “I’d love to say I planned that, but I think that’s exactly what the technology is. “People are being arrested because they are wanted.” More than 130,000 faces were scanned during the opening week of the Australia-first trial, starting June 22, and 18 arrests were made. Sixteen of those arrests related to outstanding warrants, and two were for breaching exclusion orders in entertainment precincts. “If we’ve got 4000 people in our community with arrest warrants, no one should be happy with that,” Blanch said. “If this can solve most of those problems, I think it’s a great deal.” The cameras also helped police speak to two people for welfare checks. The cameras are mounted on or near a marked WA Police van, and scan crowds to instantly detect faces and compare them against targets or people banned from certain areas. If the technology sounds the alarm, a human makes the final assessment on whether there is an actual match. The commissioner said “we have a human in the loop” to double-check false starts. Images of community members not on the alert list are automatically pixelated and deleted. “Speaking to the team who have been setting this up for the last week, the overwhelming positive feedback from our community has been
WA Police press conference interrupted as new <b>facial recognition</b> cameras force officers into action
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