Sainsbury’s rolls out Facewatch LFR, Tesco gets retrospective with Auror

Automated security cameras and facial recognition are growing presences in UK shops as a theft prevention measure, with Tesco announcing a trial of New Zealand-based Auror’s platform

Tesco will use Auror’s crime reporting platform across 40 stores to collect CCTV footage of serious incidents and theft for review by trained professionals at the Tesco Security Hub. There, they can apply facial recognition to still images for biometric suspect identification, according to Tesco’s announcement.

Auror launched a facial recognition tool within its retail crime prevention portfolio in November.

The company also makes clear in the announcement that its trial does not involve live facial recognition.

Sainsbury’s has been using LFR at two stores, in the form of Facewatch’s retail security system. The early results of that trial are in, and encouraging enough to prompt the grocery chain to expand the biometric technology to five more London locations.

Early results include a 46 percent reduction in “theft, harm, aggression and antisocial behavior.” More than 9 of 10 offenders did not return to the stores, Sainsbury’s says.

The chain’s announcement notes that Facewatch’s face biometrics have a 99.98 percent accuracy rate and that all alerts are reviewed before action is taken.

Tesco is the largest retailer in the UK, with a 28.5 percent grocery market share at the start of 2025, according to a report by analyst firm Kantar. Sainsbury’s is second (15.9 percent market share), and it and Tesco make up half of the UK’s “big four” supermarket chains.

A LinkedIn post by Responsible AI Managing Director Stephanie Gradwell compares how facial recognition use is governed in the UK, compared to Europe.

The lack of an independent audit requirement creates an “accountability void,” Gradwell argues.

Convictions for shop theft rose 20 percent in the 12 montsh ending in March, 2025, compared to the previous year, according to the UK Office of National Statistics.

Facewatch’s live facial recognition generated more than twice as many alerts in calendar 2025 and it did in 2024, according to company figures.

Article Topics

Auror  |  biometrics  |  facial recognition  |  live facial recognition  |  retail biometrics  |  UK  |  video surveillance