UK government responds to facial recognition consultation

Promise of stronger safeguards around biometrics falls short

However, the consultation response lacks detail on what specific safeguards the government is considering, and how it will address wider concerns around bias and discrimination, proportionality and necessity (a key legal test for UK police), the protection of freedom of expression, and scope creep (where use of the tech goes beyond its original purpose).

“The Home Office’s facial recognition consultation raised important questions about how police protect the privacy of people, of innocent bystanders, and the government is right to bring a wider range of visual AI technologies under statutory oversight,” said Simon Randall, CEO of visual data privacy company Pimloc.

“But promising safeguards isn’t the same as spelling them out. The government has yet to explain who can access the data, how it can be shared or reused, and how long it can be kept. Until those limits are clear, it’s difficult to see how the promised safeguards will work in practice.”

Tony Kounnis, CEO of Face Int UK, added that although the government’s promise to introduce stronger safeguards is a step in the right direction, it “falls short” of where policy needs to go.

We need more robust rules in place to ensure companies developing and deploying facial recognition technology are doing enough to protect data

“We need more robust rules in place to ensure companies developing and deploying facial recognition technology are doing enough to protect data,” he said. “Privacy by design must be the mantra, and the government cannot dawdle in tackling this issue.”

Akiko Hart, director of human rights group Liberty, said legal safeguards are long overdue, and called on the government to stop expanding police use of biometrics until these are in place.

“Millions of people have had their faces scanned without their consent. We’ve seen people hauled out of their homes after being misidentified by racially biased algorithms, and facial recognition deployments are fast becoming a fixture on our high streets, at football matches and music events,” she said.

“While the announcement that new safeguards will be introduced is a step in the right direction, now that the government has recognised stronger legislation is needed, it must finally hit pause on the rapid roll-out of facial recognition technology until this is in place with the robust transparency, oversight and safeguards needed to protect us all.”

Vague responses to concerns shared

Within the 1,826 unique responses to the government consultation, prevalent concerns revolved around data handling and retention, protecting civil liberties and public participation, trust in police and the state, and the potential for mass surveillance.

According to the government summary of the responses received, civil liberties concerns largely revolved around the potentially chilling effect of biometric surveillance, which could deter people’s lawful and free use of public space due to a “discomfort with constant observation” and prevent them from “participation in civic life” due to the psychological impacts such an atmosphere would create.

“Those respondents raising civil liberties issues often said facial recognition should be prohibited at protests and demonstrations, fearing it could be used to target or discourage participants,” it said. “Advocacy groups warned this could disproportionately affect marginalised communities and further damage trust in law enforcement.”

It further highlighted how respondents were concerned that biometric surveillance could undermine the presumption of innocence and lead the state to treat the general population as potential suspects.

“Others argued that innocent individuals should not be routinely included in watchlists, and that expanding biometric databases, such as through passport images, posed serious democratic risks by normalising monitoring, shifting power towards the state and weakening public trust,” it noted.

“Respondents [also] raised concerns that facial recognition could be used beyond its original purpose and evolve into routine mass surveillance without binding limits. Some feared misuse by future governments, including for monitoring dissent, political opposition, or excluding individuals from public spaces.”

Responding to these concerns, the government said it agrees that “technologies like facial recognition have the potential to interfere with rights, such as the right to privacy, freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly”, which is why it intends to “introduce new, specific laws governing their use”.

However, it did not provide any detail on how the specific concerns raised could be addressed, simply noting that the framework will include “detailed operational requirements and safeguards in a statutory Code of Practice” and “balance the need to respect and preserve individual human rights with the rights of the public to be safe on the streets and in their communities”.

Necessary and proportionate?

Other areas of concern revolved around whether deployments of biometric technologies would be both necessary and proportionate, with “many respondents” arguing that biometric technologies should only be used by police “where there is a demonstrable operational need and where less intrusive methods would be ineffective”.

It further noted that some believe the technologies should not be used under any circumstances because of their “concerns about accuracy, bias and broader societal impacts”, while others “accepted limited use, particularly in serious or time-critical situations” provided strong safeguards were in place.

Critics have previously highlighted the “catch net” nature of LFR surveillance, the inclusion of people in watchlists for minor offences like shoplifting that do not meet the legal threshold of serious criminality, and the selection of watchlist images based on crime categories attached to custody photos rather than a context-specific assessment of the threat presented by a given individual.

Successive biometrics commissioners have also highlighted the Home Office’s ongoing unlawful retention of millions of custody images in the Police National Database (PND), which serves as the main source of facial images for police watchlists.

The government said in its consultation response that while it “believes that biometric, facial recognition and similar technologies are valuable tools in tackling serious crime and enhancing public safety”, it also recognises “they should only be used when necessary, proportionate and justified”.

It added: “We believe that the seriousness of the crime should not be the sole criterion for assessing whether the deployment of the technologies is necessary and proportionate but instead that it must be considered alongside other factors including the scale and nature of the deployment and the impact on individual rights. The law will require justification according to specific criteria and consideration of detailed guidance.”

On whether the framework should also apply to the private sector, the government said it acknowledged the appetite for greater consistency between law enforcement and private sector use of biometrics, and committed to bringing forward a code of practice for private sector use that would complement the law enforcement-specific framework.

Pressing ahead without a framework

While the use of LFR by police – beginning with the Met’s deployment at Notting Hill Carnival in August 2016 – has ramped up substantially in recent years, there has so far been minimal public debate or consultation, with the Home Office claiming for years that there is already a “comprehensive” legal framework in place.

In that time, there have been repeated calls from Parliament and civil society for the use of facial recognition by police to be regulated.

This includes three separate inquiries by the Justice and Home Affairs Committee into shoplifting, police algorithms and police facial recognition; two of the UK’s former biometrics commissioners, Paul Wiles and Fraser Sampson; an independent legal review by Matthew Ryder QC; the UK’s Equalities and Human Rights Commission; and the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, which called for a moratorium on live facial recognition as far back as July 2019.

However, despite coming to recognise the need for a new legal framework and launching a consultation on the matter in December 2025, the government has pressed ahead with expanding use of biometric technologies.

Before the consultation had even closed, for example, the Home Office announced sweeping reform to UK policing in January 2026, which included significant investment in the LFR capabilities of police in England and Wales.

Since then, the Met Police has pushed ahead with a major expansion of facial recognition technology, committing in June 2026 to the deployment of static LFR cameras fixed to street furniture in the West End and Soho by the end of the year, which followed a pilot of this approach in Croydon.

In March 2026, the force also started to trial handheld facial recognition technology that will allow officers to conduct biometric checks on the spot.

Computer Weekly also reported on 30 October 2026 that UK Immigration Enforcement is also set to start deploying LFR technology outside of border zones to look for people who have never committed a criminal offence.