Personal Surveillance on the Back of Speed Cameras

Reports in the national press over the weekend suggest that the police are now recording a staggering 14 million images every day on Automatic Number Plate Recognition [ANPR] cameras and storing the images in a massive database at Hendon, North London.

The rather ominous slant to this story is that the pictures do not record just registration numbers. Both the driver and any front seat passenger are also included and the resolution used in the process is believed to be sufficient to be used for identification.

As usual the authorities claim that the system has proved highly successful in nabbing not only speeders but also road fund licence dodgers and insurance cheats. But they also point to the West End and Glasgow airport bombings in 2007 where information gained from ANPR cameras contributed to the apprehension of the perpetrators.

Such extensions of the original purpose of the technology have never received parliamentary approval and civil rights groups are, predictably up in arms. Shami Chakrabarti from the organisation, Liberty, is even planning a legal challenge to the practice. "That the police are doing this with no legislative basis shows a contempt for parliament, personal privacy and the law", she says.

ANPR could come under tighter scrutiny from a future Conservative government with Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Grayling, stating that the system needs "proper accountability and safeguards."

 

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