Southern Co-op's use of facial recognition system is Orwellian, privacy group

Southern Co-op says it will appreciate any constructive feedback from the ICO

Privacy rights group Big Brother Watch has filed a legal complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) against Southern Co-operative's use of biometric scanning in its retail stores.

According to Big Brother Watch, the Co-operative's biometric scans of "thousands of shoppers" in 35 stores across Bournemouth, Portsmouth, Bristol, Chichester, Southampton, London and Brighton and Hove, is illegal and "Orwellian in the extreme".

It has urged the ICO to conduct an investigation into whether the use of the facial recognition technology at Southern Co-operative stores violates the UK's data protection regulations.

In its complaint, the group describes how the face recognition technology, offered by surveillance firm Facewatch, produces a biometric profile of each visitor who enters the store where cameras are deployed, allowing Southern Co-operative to compile a "blacklist" of customers.

The system alerts the staff members if someone on the list enters the stores.

According to the group, the supermarket's employees can add individuals to a "blacklist", designating them as "subjects of interest."

Customers are not told whether the supermarket has added their facial biometric data which is kept for up to two years.

Big Brother Watch said Facewatch's facial recognition software may be used to share biometric images of "subjects of interest" with other companies that buy access to their system.

Moreover, Southern Co-operative stores utilise surveillance cameras from the Chinese state-owned company Hikvision, which has been linked to significant security vulnerabilities and also supplies cameras for the CCP's Xinjiang concentration camps.

Silkie Carlo, director of Big Brother Watch, said their legal complaint to the ICO is a key step towards defending the privacy rights of thousands of individuals who are affected by this dangerously invasive, privatised spying.

Alex Lawrence-Archer, Solicitor at data rights agency AWO said: "This kind of high-risk, biometric processing needs a strong justification, and it's not at all clear that Facewatch and Southern Co-op meet that test.

"We also highlight significant risks of unfair bias and inaccuracy in the implementation of the system, both of which further suggest that it is unlawful."

The trial of the facial recognition system in Southern Co-op was first disclosed in a blog post published on Facewatch's website by Gareth Lewis, Southern Co-op's loss prevention officer, in 2020. Lewis said at that time that they had completed "a successful trial using Facewatch FR in a select number of stores where there is a higher level of crime".

He claimed that assaults against store staff have increased by 80 per cent in recent months, the majority of the assaults occurring when the staff approached customers suspected of theft.

Southern Co-op said in a statement that it would appreciate any "constructive feedback" from the ICO.

"We take our responsibilities around the use of facial recognition extremely seriously and work hard to balance our customers' rights with the need to protect our colleagues and customers from unacceptable violence and abuse," the company added.