Foodstuffs and Facial Recognition Technology w/ The University of Auckland's Guhan Gunasekara: December 11th, 2024

Recently, an independent evaluation was conducted on Foodstuff’s trial of facial recognition technology in their security system at 25 of their outlets in the North Island.

The evaluation found that using facial recognition in security cameras reduced crime and harmful behaviour at foodstuffs outlets by 16%, based on an examination of 1742 facial recognition alerts for repeat offenders.

However, there were also 9 instances were customers were misidentified as offenders by the system, with one woman who was wrongly removed from a Pak’n’save launching a case againsts facial recognition technology with the Human Rights Review Tribunal, claiming that the technology was discriminatory.

Oto spoke to Guhan Gunasekara, an Associate Professor of Commercial Law at the Univeristy of Auckland, to discuss the implications of facial recognition technology at retail outlets, and what we can expect in the aftermath of the independent evaluation into the trial.