Facial recognition technology has been the subject of much controversy due to concerns over public surveillance.

With that in mind, an executive at one leading Chinese firm deploying the technology says that getting it right will be something of a balancing act, with considerations around data privacy on the one hand and public security issues on the other.

"Privacy is one of the major, very sensitive issues nowadays given that the data is increasing very rapidly," Candy Wu, vice president of Guangzhou, China-based CloudWalk, said during a panel at CNBC's East Tech West event.

According to a report from the South China Morning Post, CloudWalk's technology has been used to help Chinese police arrest more than 10,000 criminals over the past four years. The firm also works with banks, which use its facial identification software at ATMs.

Facial recognition companies have been at the heart of a contentious debate over how the technology is deployed in China to monitor citizens. Chinese tech companies including Huawei, Hikvision, Dahua and ZTE supply artificial intelligence-powered surveillance technology for a number of so-called "smart city" projects.