Moscow to expand facial biometrics to more of massive surveillance camera network in 2019

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin says the city will expand its network of cameras equipped with facial recognition from the subway to city streets in 2019, UrduPoint News reports.

Sobyanin said on the Russian social media site Vkontakte that the city added more than 7,000 new cameras to its surveillance network in 2018, bringing the total to more than 167,000. CCTV camera recording are used in about 70 percent of criminal investigations, and Sobyanin claims that Moscow is now among the safest megalopolises in the world.

“A facial recognition system to detect criminals has already been implemented in the metro, and this year it will be installed on street cameras,” he wrote on social media. “And this will be great. Criminals will stay away from Moscow; there will be no place for them to hide here.”

Surveillance and security systems set up around the country for the 2018 World Cup included 9 video channels dedicated to facial recognition.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  criminal ID  |  facial recognition  |  privacy  |  Russia  |  video surveillance