Facial recognition tech enhances investigations

In 2024, York Regional Police launched a digital system for storing, searching and comparing crime scene images to criminal booking images (mugshots), using facial-recognition technology. 

This new investigative tool was supported and made possible through a partnership with Peel Regional Police. In consultation with the Information and Privacy Commission of Ontario, both police services conducted research into best practices around the use of the technology in an investigative capacity. Industry-leader, IDEMIA, was ultimately selected as a vendor for the facial recognition system which was instituted on May 27, 2024.

Sharing a system encourages collaboration and inter-agency information sharing, while decreasing the purchasing, maintenance and operating costs for each service.

“As we’re all too aware, criminals don’t limit their activity to a single jurisdiction,” said York Regional Police Chief Jim MacSween. “Partnering with Peel Regional Police is cost effective and enables us to collaborate more extensively to make both communities safer.”

Facial recognition technology allows York Regional Police to compare obtained images of people identified by investigators as suspects or persons of interest with mugshots in an existing police database pursuant to the Identification of Criminals Act. 

Some residents may be concerned about their privacy and how these images are being collected. However, images are not gathered or obtained by police from any live CCTV footage or any other live-streaming material including social media—they are collected during the course of an investigation, following a criminal incident. 

Law enforcement agencies and border checkpoints across Canada were already using facial recognition technology to help solve crimes in the communities they serve and keep Canadians safe.