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Policing and Technology

Advances in technology significantly advance the capabilities of police, with few safeguards and no transparency.

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Explainer

How the police can gain access to your phone's content at a protest

Explainer

How social media monitoring can be used at a protest

Explainer

How the police can access your phone's 'unique identifiers' at a protest

Explainer

How the police can access your digital communications at a protest

Explainer

How predictive policing can be used at protests

Explainer

How the 'Law Enforcement Data Service' (LEDS) can be used at protests

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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 -

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Featured Campaign

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.
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Reports and Analysis

Long Read
Application form graphic

Fact sheet on your data rights in relation to police surveillance at protests

An overview of your data rights in relation to data processed by the police at protests (UK edition).

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Long Read
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Fact sheet on photographing police officers at a protest

An overview of relevant considerations if and when photographing or filming police at a protest (UK edition).

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Report
Migration Surveillance Regime

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.
 

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News

27th July 2021

Taming Pegasus: A Way Forward on Surveillance Tech Proliferation

6th July 2021

The Policing Bill: Immigration Officers to get phone data extraction powers

29th June 2021

Policing Bill: An unsatisfactory debut on the statute books for mobile phone extraction

25th May 2021

Privacy International and others file legal complaints across Europe against controversial facial recognition company Clearview AI

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

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Examples of Abuse

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

Peru social networks crucial in disseminating rights information

While traditional media sought to criminalize the widespread November 2020 protests in Peru following the Congressional ouster of President Vizcarra, witnesses disseminated videos and photographs of police abuse on social networks. In the fear and uncertainty, many myths also circulated. In Peru
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Our Advocacy

PI and 30 CSOs unite against use of live facial recognition technology

Today, a coalition of 31 civil society organisations release an open letter calling on Parliament to halt and ban the use of live facial recognition technology (LFRT) by the police and private companies.

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