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Dystopian FaceWatch tech placing Brits in ‘digital police line-ups’


A British civil liberties campaign organization has warned citizens are unwittingly being added to police watch lists by facial recognition

The alert from Big Brother Watch comes after a woman was mistakenly accused of being a thief after her image was captured by FaceWatch, a facial-recognition system deployed by several British retailers. As reported by the BBC, Sara (who wished to remain anonymous) entered a shop to buy chocolate but instead, she was approached immediately and told, “You’re a thief, you need to leave the store.” Sara was led away, had her bag searched and advised she was banned from all outlets that use the FaceWatch tech but it later transpired mistake had occurred and she received a letter to acknowledge the error.

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