Major UK retailers urged to quit ‘authoritarian’ police facial recognition strategy

Human rights campaigners say the Pegasus initiative wrongly criminalises people of colour, women and LGBTQ+ people

Some of Britain's biggest retailers, including Tesco, John Lewis and Sainsbury's, have been urged to pull out of a new policing strategy amid warnings it risks wrongly criminalising people of colour, women and LGBTQ+ people.

A coalition of 14 human rights groups has written to the main retailers - also including Marks & Spencer, the Co-op, Next, Boots and Primark - saying that their participation in a new government-backed scheme that relies heavily on facial recognition technology to combat shoplifting will amplify existing inequalities in the criminal justice system".