Wednesday, August 12, 2020
A victory for civil liberties
Some good news on the civil liberties for a change, the Court of Appeal has ruled that the use of automatic facial recognition (AFR) technology by South Wales Police is unlawful.
As the BBC report, this ruling follows a legal challenge brought by civil rights group Liberty and Ed Bridges, 37, from Cardiff:
The court upheld three of the five points raised in the appeal.
It said there was no clear guidance on where AFR Locate could be used and who could be put on a watchlist, a data protection impact assessment was deficient and the force did not take reasonable steps to find out if the software had a racial or gender bias.
As Ed Bridges says: "This technology is an intrusive and discriminatory mass surveillance tool.
"For three years now, South Wales Police has been using it against hundreds of thousands of us, without our consent and often without our knowledge.
"We should all be able to use our public spaces without being subjected to oppressive surveillance."
South Wales Police have said they will not appeal this ruling, which means that there is now clear criteria, set down in a legal judgement, which must be met if this technology is to be used again.
As the BBC report, this ruling follows a legal challenge brought by civil rights group Liberty and Ed Bridges, 37, from Cardiff:
The court upheld three of the five points raised in the appeal.
It said there was no clear guidance on where AFR Locate could be used and who could be put on a watchlist, a data protection impact assessment was deficient and the force did not take reasonable steps to find out if the software had a racial or gender bias.
As Ed Bridges says: "This technology is an intrusive and discriminatory mass surveillance tool.
"For three years now, South Wales Police has been using it against hundreds of thousands of us, without our consent and often without our knowledge.
"We should all be able to use our public spaces without being subjected to oppressive surveillance."
South Wales Police have said they will not appeal this ruling, which means that there is now clear criteria, set down in a legal judgement, which must be met if this technology is to be used again.
