The use of facial recognition by police in south Wales during a peaceful demonstration has been criticised as disproportionate and unnecessary in a report by the UN special rapporteur on the right to privacy, Joseph Cannataci.



He issued the interim report at the end of a two-week visit to the UK to investigate privacy rights.

South Wales police began experimenting with facial recognition in June last year, deploying it at various public events, including sporting and music venues.

The civil rights group Liberty is supporting a Cardiff resident, Ed Bridges, who wrote to the chief constable of South Wales police alleging he was tracked at a peaceful anti-arms protest and while out shopping.

In his report, Cannataci said concerns were expressed to him by civil society organisations that the use of facial recognition technology was not only violating privacy but may also have had a chilling effect on the fundamental right to association.

He wrote: “In addition to the admitted lack of precision of the technology, I find it difficult to see how the deployment of a technology that would potentially allow the identification of each single participant in a peaceful demonstration could possibly pass the test of necessity and proportionality.”

He recommended the government and police conduct strict privacy impact assessments before deployment, even as a pilot, of technologies potentially affecting the enjoyment of the right to privacy.



A spokesman for South Wales police said it would respond in due course to the correspondence from Bridges and Liberty. He added: “The force has been very cognisant of concerns surrounding privacy and are confident that our approach is lawful and proportionate.”

The rapporteur, whose job was created in response to the disclosures of mass surveillance by Edward Snowden in 2013, produces individual country reports on levels of privacy around the world.

He will give UK organisations mentioned in his report until September to respond. He will produce a final report in December for submission to the UN human rights council early in 2019.



During his two weeks in the UK, he visited Cardiff, Edinburgh, Belfast and London, speaking to parliamentarians, officials, civil rights groups, members of the judiciary, MI6, MI5 and the surveillance agency GCHQ.

Speaking at a press conference in London, Cannataci said there had been a marked improvement by the intelligence agencies on privacy rights since he described draft legislation on surveillance in 2015 as “worse than scary”.

He described the creation of a new oversight body, the Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s Office (IPCO), as a significant improvement on what had existed before.

However, he expressed concern the IPCO had the dual task of authorising surveillance requests by the intelligence agencies as well as being responsible for oversight of how that surveillance was carried out.

“To many observers, and especially people outside the UK, the new law seems to create a situation whereby somebody is expected to be marking his own homework,” Cannataci said.

Security minister Ben Wallace said: “We have some of the best police and security and intelligence officers in the world. They work day and night to keep us safe from terrorists, paedophiles and other criminals that have no regard for the law.

“The special rapporteur’s overarching conclusions on the system of safeguards and oversight we introduced in the Investigatory Powers Act are welcome.

“Through this ground breaking and world leading legislation, we have made sure those charged with protecting us have the powers they need to keep us safe but that these powers are used in a way that does not undermine our privacy.”