Policing

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Explainer

Push This Button For Evidence: Digital Forensics

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Police mobile phone extraction explainer

Explainer

101: Integrated Policing

Podcast: Extraction

43m27s

You’re a witness or a victim or a suspect of a crime; or even just travelling going on holiday. Officials demand your phone, then disappear with it. What happened to your phone? What happened to your data? What will happen to you?

We all generate vast amounts of data using our mobile phones -

Photo by King's Church International on Unsplash

Campaigns

UK Law Enforcement Data Service (LEDS): the new police mega-database

The Home Office is currently developing a UK-wide police 'super-database' containing a vast amount of data, which mixes both evidential and intelligence material. Here is why PI is concerned about LEDS and what we are doing about it.

Reports and Analysis

Report

The UK’s Privatised Migration Surveillance Regime: A Rough Guide for Civil Society

Privacy International has released a guide to how UK authorities track and monitor immigrants and the companies which profit.

Long Read

Facewatch: the Reality Behind the Marketing Discourse

As more and more of us feel compelled to cover our faces with masks, companies that work on facial recognition are confronted with a new challenge: how to make their products relevant in an era where masks have gone from being seen as the attribute of those trying to hide to the accessory of good

Long Read

Is over-policing the future?: Development of the UK Law Enforcement Data Service (LEDS)

The Home Office development of the Law Enforcement Data Service (LEDS) is problematic and needs parliamentary oversight. Here's why we are concerned and what we are doing about it.

News

17th March 2021

The new Policing Bill fails to provide sufficient safeguards around extraction of victims' data.

8th March 2021

Challenging Police records management: our response to the public consultation on the way Police in England and Wales record and store information

3rd September 2020

Challenging over-policing: our response to the public consultation on the Law Enforcement Data Service (LEDS)

18th June 2020

Press release: Critical ICO report says the Police must stop taking data from victims' phones without better safeguards

11th June 2020

Why Amazon's temporary ban of police use of facial recognition is not enough

14th November 2019

Can the police limit what they extract from your phone?

Examples of Abuse

Want to know how this translate in the real world? Here is the latest example in the news.

UK police disproportionately fine BAME people for lockdown violations

UK police were almost seven times more likely to issue fines to black, Asian, and minority ethnic people than white feel for lockdown infractions. The exact figures varied around the UK; in Cumbria, which is mostly white and where people from a BAME background are more likely to be visitors, it was

See more examples of abuse

Our Advocacy

Covid-19 doesn't discriminate based on immigration status - nor should the Home Office

Privacy International has joined JCWI, Liberty, Medact and other UK civil society organisations to call on Priti Patel, the UK Home Secretary to enact urgent changes to ensure the safety of migrants in light of the Covid-19 pandemic.

View more advocacy