Security News > 2020 > May > You can't have it both ways: Anti-coronavirus masks may thwart our creepy face-recog cameras, London cops admit
Counter-coronavirus masks may thwart London police plans to deploy creepy facial-recognition cameras across the capital, senior managers have admitted.
Two London Assembly members, Caroline Pidgeon and Sian Berry, wrote to Metropolitan Police commissioner Cressida Dick, asking whether the "Unreliable, unregulated" technology would be withdrawn during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In a letter published [PDF] on the London Assembly website, the two elected representatives said: "We both believe that the way in which LFR is being rolled out as an operational tool in London is ill-advised, and that this technology will have a chilling effect on civil liberties if it is not used with clarity, accountability and with full democratic consent."
London's deployment of Neoface tech supplied by NEC Global relies on people's full faces being visible - something not possible when most Britons will be wearing masks during the coming months.
Facial-recognition technology in London is seen by police as a high-tech solution to their woes - and managers are determined to roll it out regardless of public opposition to the China-style surveillance.