Football chiefs to catch hooligans and terrorists with ‘game-changer’ AI tech

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    Football chiefs are to use facial recognition technology to safeguard the game from hooligans, trolls and terrorists.

    The controversial AI – which uses mathematical measurements of people's faces to compare them to photos on a pre-set watchlist in real time – is set to be deployed at a host of tournaments next year including Euro 24. When cameras continuously monitoring crowds outside stadiums find a match to a facial image on the watchlist a signal can be sent to handheld devices alerting police and security guards to the target.

    They can then intervene before threats materialise. The watchlist could be loaded with images of convicted hooligans or potential terrorists.

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    It may also include photos of football trolls identified in social media trawls for blitzing players or referees with online threats and abuse. Like hooligans and terrorists they could be arrested if they try to turn up to matches.

    Football world governing body FIFA's director of safety, security and access Helmut Josef Spahn said facial recognition technology would "identify potential threats" before they could develop. "Continuous monitoring of evolving threats and adaptability to changing circumstances is crucial to ensuring a safe and secure environment for participants and fans," he told the International Security Journal.

    What do you think of this plan? Let us know in the comment section below


    The Metropolitan Police deploy facial recognition cameras at major events. Its software studies faces of anyone who comes within around 20ft of a camera and compares them to watchlist images.

    Those who did not match were instantly pixelated – leaving only the faces of suspects exposed. The Met's director of intelligence Lindsey Chiswick said the tech was a "game-changer".

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    "It allows us to specifically target people we actively want to trace allowing us to be more focussed on the right individuals be they suspects, absconders or vulnerable missing people. It feels like we have reached a significant moment in the future of policing," she added.

    But Big Brother Watch's legal and policy officer Madeleine Stone described facial recognition as "an authoritarian mass surveillance tool that turns the public into walking ID cards" and "may be used in China and Russia but has no place on the streets of Britain". "This dystopian technology must urgently be banned," she said.

    • FIFA

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