Proactive Investors - A database of passports and housing details of around 45 million individuals is set to become a powerful tool in fighting crimes such as shoplifting, vehicle theft and burglary, according to plans by the government.
Under the new plans, video footage from CCTV, doorbell technology and dashcams will be compared against facial images from government databases, including immigration records, to help with identifying suspects.
Chris Philp, the crime and policing minister, intends to integrate data from the police national database, HM Passport Office, and other national databases to enable police to find matches with a single click.
Hoping to have this fused system operational within two years, Philp believes the database could revolutionise how thieves are apprehended.
Speaking at a Conservative party conference in Manchester, Philp said: “I’m going to be asking police forces to search all of those databases — the police national database, which has custody images, but also other databases like the passport database — not just for shoplifting but for crime generally to get those matches, because the technology is now so good that you can get a blurred image and get a match for it.”
Currently, facial recognition software is limited to the police’s national database, which only contains information on arrested individuals, while passport data is provided to the force but remains unused because it sits on a different IT system.
Philp aims to have police forces immediately utilise the separate passport system to identify criminals while the combined database is in progress.
“Operationally, I’m asking them to do it now. In the medium term, which I mean the next two years, we’re going to try and create a new data platform so you can press one button [and it] lets you search it all in one go,” Philp added.
Launching the initiative has come at a time when concerns about low prosecution rates for theft-related crimes and shoplifting incidents have surged, with many retailers speaking out about the damage theft is causing the high streets.