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Automated facial recognition

NEC has provided a facial recognition system for South Wales Police in the UK through NEC Europe. The system uses NeoFace Watch, NEC's facial recognition software platform featuring the world's highest recognition precision – according to the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (http://www.nec.com/en/press/201703/global_20170316_01.html).

NeoFace Watch is used for real-time CCTV surveillance, as well as still image and recorded video face search, which helps to ensure security in crowded locations, such as airports and stadiums. South Wales Police has deployed NeoFace Watch using CCTV cameras mounted on a number of police vehicles and is using its real-time surveillance capability to locate persons of interest on pre-determined watchlists, including criminals, suspects, vulnerable individuals and missing persons.

Assistant Chief Constable Richard Lewis said: "Facial recognition technology will enable us to search, scan and monitor images and video against a range of offender databases leading to faster and more accurate identification of persons of interest. This has been borne out by the recent arrest of a 34-year old man from Cardiff who was wanted for a recall to prison. He had walked past several officers on a main street in Cardiff before he was identified by the cameras and it is probably an arrest we would not have made at any previous time."

The South Wales Police system was deployed for the final of the UEFA Champions League, held at the National Stadium of Wales with up to 170 000 football fans in Cardiff on that day. "We deployed NEC's real-time solution, which enabled trained officers to monitor the movement of people at strategic locations in and around the city centre during this massive event. It was a great success," said ACC Lewis. South Wales Police is the first police force to use a real-time facial recognition system at a large-scale sports event in the UK.

The South Wales system will also be used to cross-check still images and recorded video taken at crime scenes against approximately 500 000 photos currently held in its custody image database. "NEC is very proud to be working closely with South Wales Police. We now have deployments of NeoFace Watch in 47 countries, used by a wide range of government and commercial organisations," said Chris de Silva, head of global face recognition solutions, NEC Europe.

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