Ottawa police take first steps towards using Idemia facial recognition

Police in Canada’s capitol Ottawa, Ontario are taking their first step towards a potential implementation of facial recognition from Idemia.

The Ottawa Police Service Board (OPSB) approved a decision to go ahead with Phase 1 of its facial recognition project in a meeting on June 22. This initial phase involves onboarding to the shared facial recognition technology network used by police in Southern Ontario’s York, Peel, and Halton regions. The facial recognition network uses face biometrics algorithms from Idemia Identity and Security Canada LLC

Ottawa Police Service’s contract with Idemia includes only a deposit this year, for 150,000 Canadian dollars (roughly US$106,000). That deposit will be taken from the one-time implementation cost of CA$472,631 ($333,000) OPS is planning for. Beginning in 2027, OPS will also have to pay CA$155,000 ($109,000) in annually-increasing maintenance costs that reach $161,477 ($114,000) in 2031. The project’s total cost, including maintenance, is therefore CA$1.26 million ($890,000) over 5 years of operation.

Launch preparations

A report to the OPSB from the Chief of Police specifies that the system would be used with booking photographs and any possible matches reviewed independently by multiple trained analysts. The first phase of the project includes legal reviews, a Privacy Impact Assessment and the development of policies and procedures for data sharing and use. The force will also carry out an “AI governance review, training, consultation, communications planning, technical readiness and performance measurement.”

Idemia’s latest facial recognition algorithm submitted to NIST for its Face Recognition Technology Evaluation (FRTE) has the fourth-lowest False Negative Identification Rate (FNIR) at False Positive Identification Rate (FPIR) 0.003 in both the Mugshot-to-Mugshot (N=12 million) and Mugshot-to-Profile 90 degrees categories, as of July 3, 2026.

The training will include bias awareness and privacy obligations, and OPS will also evaluate the equity safeguards built into the system. OPS will make the facial recognition software available to five analysts.

The OPS completed a 60-day proof of concept that showed facial recognition could potentially help criminal investigations in 2018-2019, the paper says.

And the report emphasizes a key point that has been missed by several police forces in neighboring U.S.: “A facial recognition result does not confirm identity on its own and is not evidence by itself.”

No built-in facial recognition for body-cameras

The Ottawa Citizen links the facial recognition initiative to OPSB’s plan to deploy body-worn cameras, which was approved at the same meeting. Ottawa has struck a deal to acquire body-cams from Axon with built-in AI capabilities under a $27.2-million contract that runs until 2031.

The report to the OPSB does not mention body-cameras, and the privacy impact assessment and procedure documents for Ottawa Police use of body-cams does not mention facial recognition, except in one place. A “Risk Register” categorizing 23 risks identified from the use of body-cameras notes in an explanation of the risk of bias: “No facial recognition or biometric identification used.”

Article Topics

biometric matching  |  biometrics  |  Canada  |  facial recognition  |  Idemia Public Security  |  law enforcement