French councils ‘broke rules’ on smart camera surveillance of public
Illegal camera activity included the use of real-time facial recognition software
The CNIL identified several instances of illegal or irregular use of ‘augmented’ camera software
Danijel Hunjek/Shutterstock
Six communes in France have received a warning from the national technology and freedom watchdog after being found to have broken the rules on real-time smart camera surveillance of the public.
The Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertés (CNIL) issued ‘formal notices’ to the six communes and the Interior Ministry after it analysed their use of automated smart cameras and software.
In a statement published on December 12, the CNIL said that it had found several police and gendarmerie services, as well as the Interior Ministry, had been using video analysis software illegally for several years. In addition communes had not met the CNIL’s compliance obligations (e.g. data privacy assessments).
The CNIL also said that facial recognition software, which cannot be used in real-time, had been used “just once, during the riots in the summer of 2023”.
The CNIL did not find any use of facial recognition functions in six of the eight municipalities audited.
However, it did find illegal or irregular use of ‘augmented’ cameras, in particular:
Automated detection of situations suggesting a public offence (parking, etc.)
Automated detection of events considered to be ‘abnormal’ or potentially dangerous (gatherings of individuals, etc.)
Statistics generation (e.g. by measuring the number of people using an area, differentiating between pedestrians, lorries, bicycles, scooters, etc.) without providing users with sufficient information on the cameras being used.
The use of cameras to detect offences such as parking contraventions is becoming increasingly common in France, but communes must adhere to strict rules on real-time recording and facial recognition to ensure these cameras are being used legally.
Read also: Surge in parking fines as French towns use radar checking cars
What does the law say about automated smart cameras?
The law states that the use of cameras that use automatic real-time image processing software is prohibited (except when collecting statistics - measuring attendance at an event, for example).
The only other exception is if the cameras are being used on an experimental basis at major, high-attendance events (such as sports matches or large gigs) where there is a greater risk of possible terrorist activity or other threats to personal safety. This is allowed until March 31, 2025.
Even then automatic image analysis software (referred to as logiciels de rapprochement judiciaire, LRJ, forensic matching software) is still only allowed to be used on already-recorded images for the purposes of legal investigations, and must be used offline.
What has the CNIL recommended now?
The CNIL has stated that the Ministry of the Interior must:
Require departments that use automated image analysis processing software to update their compliance documents
Take appropriate measures to prevent the use of facial recognition functions in some of the video analysis software used.
The CNIL added that it decided to audit the Interior Ministry in particular after the publication (in November 2023) of an investigative newspaper report that revealed that the ministry had used video analysis software sold by the company Briefcam.
