United Kingdom - October 2022

Rishi Sunak has become the fifth Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in six years following a cursory Conservative Party leadership contest. His predecessor Liz Truss resigned following the continuing fallout from the ‘mini-budget’ in September, making her the shortest-serving Prime Minister of the United Kingdom with a term of 45 days. Sunak has become the first UK Prime Minister of colour, and also the wealthiest, with him and his wife possessing double the wealth of King Charles III and Queen Consort Camilla.

Sources: The Guardian, BBC News, Reuters

In auditing three trial deployments of live facial recognition (LFR) technology by police forces in England and Wales, researchers from the University of Cambridge’s Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy found that all three did not meet minimum ethical and legal standards for the governance. According to the researchers, LFR in its current form fails to meet standards for privacy, discrimination, accountability, and oversight – which in turn would disproportionality affect marginalized groups. The authors of the report have called for a ban on the use of facial recognition technology by police forces in public spaces.

Sources: Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy