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Police use of digital, scientific and other technologies
How can the police and wider criminal justice system best balance the potential benefits and risks of using new technologies?

Benefits and risks

Following its horizon scanning report on Cyber crime and harm earlier this month, the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST)  has just (25 October 2024) published a follow up report on the Use of digital, scientific and other technologies by the police and wider criminal justice system which asks:

“How can the police and wider criminal justice system best balance the potential benefits and risks of using new technologies?”

Overview

The report starts by noting that a range of new technologies and applications are increasingly available to police forces and the wider criminal justice system, citing the move online of a number of courts services and HMCTS plan to roll out a new video hearings service. Police forces are already making use of a wide range of new technologies for different functions including:

  • crime prevention, for example predictive policing using AI to predict hotspots for future crime 
  • mobility, such as autonomous vehicles and drones
  • identification and tracing, for example, automatic number plate recognition
  • surveillance and sensing, including face recognition technologies
  • analytics, using AI-enabled approaches
  • communications and interconnectivity, such as automated updates for victims or AI technology used to support call and response routing

Opportunities

Government, police forces and other sector stakeholders have noted potential benefits to using new technologies in the CJS:

  • improving performance, for example, in preventing and detecting crime, using Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) to identify criminals, or speeding up court procedures
  • improving efficiency by freeing up police time and capacity for higher priority work
  • making it easier for individuals and communities to communicate and interact with the police, including for people with disabilities or where English is not their first language
  • supporting transparency, accountability and trust, for example, the use of body worn cameras

Challenges

However, these opportunities for more efficient and effective use of resources also bring a number of challenges raised by a wide range of academics and civil liberties group. Discussions centre around five key issues:

  • ethical and human rights, civil liberties and the right to a fair trial 
  • data protection
  • validity and accuracy of technologies
  • risks around equality and discrimination
  • right to privacy, for example, from access to smart doorbell footage

Facial recognition

One very contested area is that of police use of facial recognition technology (FRT). Multiple concerns include: the intrusiveness of FRT and its impact on privacy rights, and a lack of oversight, accountability and transparency.  There is particular debate about the relative accuracy of FRT for different demographic groups, and the risk that its use exacerbates discrimination. 

A 2023 National Physical Laboratory evaluation for the Metropolitan Police Service found no differences in accuracy of identification by age, gender or ethnicity for Retrospective or Operator-Initiated FRT. However, for Live FRT, it found some differences in accuracy for people aged under 20 and for Black subjects, with lower face-match thresholds. (Lower thresholds mean the FRT system is less strict, increasing the risk of matching an innocent person with an individual on an offender watchlist.)

Given the current concerns around public confidence in policing, there is a growing concern that the introduction of  some new technologies may impact negatively on public trust. There is a consensus that technology offers many potential benefits but that it will be important for government and police leaders to be transparent when communicating its use.

Future developments

The speed of technological development (by both law enforcement and organised crime) keeps increasing and the POST report highlights a number of possible future applications of technology in the CJS including forensic analysis of genetics and digital evidence, or remote sensing of drugs or weapons.

Researchers have also wondered about the extent to which AI could appropriately be used in sentencing to reduce potential bias, increase consistency or speed up access to justice.

Government responsibilities

The briefing sets out a number of challenges for Government including ensuring mechanisms for oversight and regulation work effectively and evolve to keep pace with technological innovation. Historically, government procurement of large scale technology programmes has often been ineffective and financially wasteful. But the fundamental challenge is to ensure that law enforcement technological advancements can at least match the advances made by criminals while at the same time balancing the rights of the general public to privacy and a fair trial.

 

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