Bavarian Interior Minister wants live facial recognition at German train stations

The Bavarian Minister of Interior has come out in support of police deployment of live facial recognition, as Germany discusses a new draft bill that would allow retrospective biometric matching to track down criminals.

Minister Joachim Herrmann, a member of the Christian Social Union (CSU) party in Bavaria, has been advocating for facial recognition in public spaces for years. His proposal is to deploy the technology using cameras at train stations and squares and he believes this could be achieved despite data protection rules.

“It is clear that photos that do not produce a match will be deleted immediately,” Hermann told public service broadcaster Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR) last week.

German Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser, however, has noted that the use of real-time facial recognition systems is only possible within narrow limits under the European Union AI Act.

Earlier this month, Faeser introduced the draft bill, proposing that the Federal Criminal Police Office the Federal Police use facial recognition to compare images from video footage to social media pictures to determine the location of suspects and criminals, including members of the Islamic State.

The bill does not allow real-time surveillance in public spaces, nor is live facial recognition planned at train stations at the nationwide level, according to Faeser. The draft bill still has to be approved by the Cabinet and the Bundestag.

Bavaria’s data protection commissioner Thomas Petri has also shot down the Bavarian Interior Minister’s proposal, citing issues with the constitution. He also questioned the system’s error rate, adding that it could lead to hundreds of people being wrongly arrested at train stations.

“This is a serious encroachment on the fundamental rights of all people who move around and spend time in these public places,” says Petri.

Article Topics

biometric identification  |  biometrics  |  criminal ID  |  facial recognition  |  Germany  |  legislation  |  real-time biometrics  |  video surveillance