Live Facial Recognition: Trust and Legitimacy as Predictors of Public Support for Police Use of New Technology

Abstract

Facial recognition technology is just one of a suite of new digital tools police and other security providers around the world are adopting in an effort to function more safely and efficiently. This paper reports results from a major new London-based study exploring public responses to Live Facial Recognition (LFR): a technology that enables police to carry out real-time automated identity checks in public spaces. We find that public trust and legitimacy are important factors predicting the acceptance or rejection of LFR. Crucially, trust and, particularly, legitimacy seem to serve to alleviate privacy concerns about police use of this technology. In an era where police use of new technologies is only likely to increase, especially as the Covid-19 global pandemic develops, these findings have important implications for police–public relations and how the ‘public voice’ is fed into debates.