Police face calls to end use of facial recognition software

Analysts find system often wrongly identifies people and could breach human rights law

Police are facing calls to halt the use of facial recognition software to search for suspected criminals in public after independent analysis found matches were only correct in a fifth of cases and the system was likely to break human rights laws.

Academics from the University of Essex were granted access to six live trials by the Metropolitan police in Soho, Romford and at the Westfield shopping centre in Stratford, east London.