Pre-Crime in the UK: Businesses Crowdsource a Watch List (arstechnica.com)

Posted by Soulskill on Friday December 18, 2015 @05:30AM from the better-hope-you-don't-look-suspicious dept.

Press2ToContinue writes: In the film Minority Report, people are rounded up by the Precrime police agency before they actually commit the crime. In the movie, this pre-crime information is provided by 'pre-cognition' savants floating in a goopy nutrient bath who can apparently see the future. Replace those gibbering pre-cog mutants with Facewatch. It's a system that lets retailers, publicans, and restaurateurs share private video footage with the police and each other. It is integrated with real-time face recognition systems, such as NEC's NeoFace. Where previously a member of staff had to keep an eye out for people, on the crowdsourced Facewatch watch list, now the system can automatically tell you if someone on the watch list has just entered the premises. A member of staff can then keep an eye on that person, or ask them politely (or not) to leave.

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That's Not Pre-Crime by Anonymous Coward · 2015-12-18 05:41 · Score: 3, Informative

It's a system that lets retailers, publicans, and restaurateurs share private video footage with the police and each other.
That's not pre-crime. That's sharing video footage of actual behavior.
Casinos has done this forever, and I'd imagine so do large chain grocery, department, and big box stores.
Old time US version by Kohath · 2015-12-18 05:46 · Score: 4, Informative

Retailers post pictures on their wall saying "Do no accept checks from this person". It's just a reputation system committed to paper. It's not really a problem, but it's also not something the government (police) should be involved in because government blacklists violate due process rights.