Live Facial Recognition

On Friday 10th April a Live Facial Recognition Operation was run on Portobello Road. These operations are run regularly across London.

This resulted in arrests for the following

1)Breach of Court Order on 05/11/2025 & 10/12/2025

2) Burglary

3) Breach of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order

Officers also detained a male who had stolen Jewellery from the Antiques Parade.

On Monday 13th April the same operation was run in Knightsbridge.

For every person who walks past:

Their face is scanned

The system compares it to watchlist images

One of two things happens:

The image is immediately and permanently deleted

No data is stored

No officer sees the image

The system generates an alert, not a decision

A trained human officer manually checks the image

If the officer agrees it looks like the wanted person, officers may speak to the individual

A computer match alone never results in arrest

Message Sent By
Charlotte Legg
(Metropolitan Police, Inspector, North Kensington NPT)