People arrested and de-arrested following live facial recognition match since January 2023
Freedom of information request reference no: 01.FOI.24.036192
I note you seek access to the following information:
I am writing to request the following information relating to live facial recognition arrests:
- The number of people arrested and subsequently de-arrested following a live facial recognition match since 1 January 2023
- The number of people wrongly arrested following a live facial recognition match since 1 January 2023
Decision
I have today decided to disclose some of the requested information. Some data has been withheld as it is exempt from disclosure and therefore this response serves as a Refusal Notice under Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the Act) by virtue of the following exemptions:
Section 40(2)(3)&(4) – Personal Information
Reason for decision
Section 3 of the Data Protection Act 2018 confirms that information which relates to an identified or identifiable living individual is Personal Data.
The Freedom of Information Act provides an exemption for Personal Data and this is known as the section 40 exemption.
The information sought under your Freedom of Information request includes the following which we consider to be Personal Data
• Low single figure data which risks an individual being identified especially if combined with other information
Where the request is seeking access to third party personal data the section 40(2) exemption may be engaged.
In order to apply the Section 40(2) exemption the disclosure of the requested information must satisfy either the first, second or third conditions as defined by subsections 3A, 3B and 4A of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (as amended by Schedule 19 of the Data Protection Act 2018, specifically Section 58 of that schedule).
The first condition ensures that the exemption would apply in circumstances where the disclosure of the information would breach any of the Data Protection Act 2018 principles.
There are six Data Protection principles set out in the 2018 act and these can be found at section 34.
In this instance I have decided that the disclosure of the Personal Data would be incompatible with the first Data Protection principle which states that the processing (in this case the disclosure) of the data must be both lawful and fair.
Disclosure
Q1 - The number of people arrested and subsequently de-arrested following a live facial recognition match since 1 January 2023
Due to the low value data this information is exempt under S40(2) please see above.
Q2 - The number of people wrongly arrested following a live facial recognition match since 1 January 2023
No wrongful arrests have occurred so the response to this question is no information held.
Although there have been instances where (A) individuals have been arrested and (B) it subsequently become clear that the threshold for arrest was no longer met (leading to prompt de-arrest); we are confident that in each case where this has occurred, the original arrest decision was correct at the time that it was made, with the constables having reasonable grounds for making the original arrest decision.