Met police will deploy AI-led live facial recognition at Notting Hill Carnival 2026 for the second year in a row
Notting Hill Carnival is set to experience its second consecutive year of AI surveillance supplied by software company NEC, a once dominant mobile phone manufacturer in Japan. Metropolitan Police officers will use the technology following earlier trials, with live facial recognition deployed at Carnival last year, in 2025 which they say enhances existing security measures. This year, the event will mark its 60th anniversary and is set to host activities ranging from live music, DJ sets and performances to a procession and more, as the celebration attracts more than one million visitors for its world-famous Bank Holiday weekend celebration of culture and history.
Police will deploy live facial recognition (LFR) cameras during the bank holiday weekend, both at the event and on routes leading into it. The operation works by capturing images through automated facial matching systems, which police hope will identify matches against their own watchlists. The Met says it will check each alert before action is taken.
The System
The software and its algorithm are operated by NEC Software Solutions UK under the Met’s own product, NeoFace Watch. When a person of interest is detected, the Met Police decide whether to take action, with filming and detection remaining in operation until the programme ends.
Need To Knows
Who will be filmed and scanned by LFR systems? Everyone passing through an active camera zone can have their face scanned by the system.
What happens next? Police compare images against a pre-prepared watchlist containing people wanted by police or the courts, alongside other individuals relevant to the specific policing operation.
Will police keep my record on file despite a clean record? Officially, the Met says biometric data belonging to people who do not generate an alert is deleted immediately after being checked by the system.
Are police looking for specific persons of interest? The LFR watchlist is collated in advance. This can include missing persons, wanted individuals and persons relevant to a public safety operation.
How do I know they won’t just keep my information? We don’t, and that’s what rights experts are concerned about.
Opposition
Rights experts and groups strongly oppose the operation and say surveillance turns the Carnival into a mass checkpoint instead of a cultural celebration.
In 2025, interim director of Big Brother Watch, Rebecca Vincent, criticised the Met for its use of intrusive software, calling it “worrying” and “invasive”. In a statement, she said: “We know that LFR is less accurate at recognising minority faces, so using it to target people attending this beloved cultural event is particularly concerning. The Met should be investing in a properly resourced police presence on the ground to tackle real criminals, rather than violating the privacy rights of millions of innocent carnival-goers and local residents.”
Human Rights Watch called for a ban, describing its use as “a serious risk to non-discrimination, freedom of expression, assembly and association rights”, while Green Party politician and Hackney Mayor Zoë Garbett said: “Deploying live facial recognition at Notting Hill Carnival, an event rooted in anti-racist history and Black Caribbean culture, is a shocking and concerning decision from the Met.”
Open Letter to The Met
A joint coalition formed of 11 rights groups, including the Runnymede Trust, Big Brother Watch, and Liberty, wrote a letter to Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley opposing its implementation, saying, “There is no clear legal basis for your force’s use of LFR” and that the system is inherently racially biased.
The Met denies these claims. However, independent researcher Professor Pete Fussey responded to the force, saying: “The Met regularly claims that its system has had independent testing for bias. But a closer reading of that research shows the evidence is not robust enough to support the claims being made.”
In response to backlash against its proposal to use LFR at Notting Hill Carnival this year, the Met’s Commander Claire Smart, Gold Commander for Notting Hill Carnival 2026, said the force will deploy 7,000 officers alongside its facial recognition programme.
“We have also strengthened our plans to target those who come intending to commit violence or engage in other criminality. We will use intelligence-led tactics including stop and search, as well as the increased deployment of live facial recognition cameras, to identify offenders, prevent harm and intervene early wherever possible.”
Photo: David Sedlecký / CC BY-SA 4.0
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