This week, the metropolitan police announced their plans for the next phase in the use of technology in policing. Sistah Space opposes the rollout of live facial recognition by the Metropolitan Police. The evidence is clear that this technology is racially biased, and we are deeply concerned about what it means for the Black community it will be turned on. We are calling for facial recognition to be taken off the table.
We say this while wanting the same thing most Londoners want, a safer city, and we recognise the responsibility the police carry to deliver it. Some of what the Met is trialling could genuinely help protect people, and we welcome the chance to help shape how those tools are tested and used, with the communities most affected in the room from the start.
But live facial recognition is different, and on this we cannot stay quiet.
For the women we serve, the police are not neutral ground, and this announcement does not arrive on a blank page. Our community's distrust is is memory, and it is earned. In 1999 the Macpherson Report found the Metropolitan Police institutionally racist. In 2023 the Casey Review found the same, alongside institutional misogyny, and concluded the Met does not take violence against women and girls as seriously as other crime. Two landmark reviews, twenty-four years apart, the same finding.
Now add the technology. Facial recognition learns from biased data. Landmark MIT research found it misidentifies darker-skinned women up to 34.7% of the time, against under 1% for lighter-skinned men, and a system used by UK police was found last year to misidentify Black women more than any other group. In 2020 the Court of Appeal ruled police use of this technology unlawful, in part for failing to address racial and gender discrimination under the Equality Act.
We have already seen what this looks like. In 2024, Shaun Thompson, a Black anti-knife-crime volunteer, was wrongly flagged by the Met's live facial recognition near London Bridge, held for almost 30 minutes and pressed for his fingerprints under threat of arrest, even after he had proved the system was wrong.
When this technology misidentifies a Black woman, she will not be met by a machine. She will be questioned by officers from a force repeatedly found to be institutionally racist. A false match becomes a real encounter, carrying the risk of aggression, wrongful charges and abuse. The bias in the technology and the bias in the institution compound.
The harm goes wider still. Mass surveillance does not only misidentify, it changes what it means to move through public space. The same cameras that scan a high street can be turned on Black communities protesting police violence, or gathering peacefully at cultural events like Notting Hill Carnival. Technology that chills the right to assemble and to be seen safely in public is not a price our community should be asked to pay.
This is not abstract. Our 2025 research with more than 2,200 Black women found 97% do not feel confident they would be treated fairly by police. That is the trust gap this technology will widen.
Safer policing does not come from more cameras. It comes from cultural competency, the principle behind Valerie's Law, our campaign for mandatory cultural competency training across police and statutory agencies.
So our position is twofold. On live facial recognition, our answer is no, and we ask for it to be withdrawn. On the wider advances being trialled, our hand is extended. We want to help to make sure they are:
transparent
independently overseen
assessed for their impact on equality
built with the communities they will affect
With new legislation now being developed, this is the moment to get it right, and we welcome the chance to contribute to that work alongside the Met and MOPAC.
Sources
Macpherson Report (Stephen Lawrence Inquiry), 1999.
Baroness Casey Review, 2023.
Buolamwini & Gebru, Gender Shades, MIT, 2018.
R (Bridges) v Chief Constable of South Wales Police [2020] EWCA Civ 1058.
Thompson v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, 2024 (ongoing).
POST, Facial Recognition Technology in Policing, 2026.
Sistah Space, Hidden in Plain Sight, 2025.
Thank you for reading.
Every issue of this newsletter is part of something bigger: a community that refuses to let Black women survivors go unseen. If this letter moved you, here are a few ways to turn that into action.
Ways to support us
💷 Donate. Your support funds specialist, culturally rooted care for Black women and girls affected by domestic and sexual abuse, and brings us closer to opening the UK's first refuge built for our community.
🤝 Volunteer. We're always looking for people who can give time and skills, from frontline support to admin, events, design and fundraising. Tell us what you bring.
📣 Fundraise or partner. Run a campaign, nominate us as your charity of the year, or bring your organisation on board. email: [email protected]
🛍️ Shop and show up. Come to our events, share our work, and stand with us in person. Details below.
🔗 Spread the word. Forward this newsletter to one person who should be reading it. Reach is its own kind of support.