Sainsbury’s store suspends AI facial recognition scanning after customer wrongly flagged as shoplifter

Sainsbury’s has suspended its live AI facial recognition scanning technology at one of its London stores after a customer was wrongly flagged as a shoplifter.

Matt Arnold, 46, was forced to leave the East Dulwich branch earlier this month in an incident described as “human error” by the supermarket giant.

Mr Arnold had been trying to purchase alcohol when he was identified by the AI technology in connection with an incident that had taken place that week.

The comedy promoter described it as a “terrifying glimpse of the future” that risks embarrassing customers and forcing staff to follow automated alerts rather than human logic.

He told BBC London: “They came over and said I had to leave. The staff member said I'd been identified by the AI, and the cameras had flagged me.

“A shoplifter does not walk around with that much shopping, they don't scan it through, they don't put their Nectar card through.

“But what upset me was thinking this is what the future could be - people just listen to what the machine tells them to do without thinking about the consequences.”

After leaving the store, he said he saw an overhead CCTV monitor alert with a red circle surrounding his face.

The supermarket uses security system Facewatch, which is used by more than 100 businesses in the UK.

Sainsbury’s said it might ask the company to suspend the system when it needs to investigate a complaint. This gives it time to provide additional training or review its processes, it added.

A spokesperson added: “We have contacted Mr Arnold to apologise for his experience at our Dulwich superstore.

“The incident was caused by human error, not the facial recognition technology.

“Customers can be reassured that the Facewatch system has a 99.98 per cent accuracy rate, and every match is reviewed by a trained manager.”

A Facewatch spokesperson said: “We can confirm that our live facial recognition technology was not at fault in this incident. A correct alert was sent to the retailer, but was subsequently subject to human error in the way it was handled and communicated to the customer by the retailer.”

Mr Arnold told the broadcaster that a 0.2 per cent error rate was still “a lot of people when millions go into a Sainsbury's shop each week”.

In January, Warren Rajah, 42, was shopping in his local London branch when he was approached by employees and made to leave.

Mr Rajah, who described feeling like a “criminal”, had been confused with another individual who was listed as an offender in the system and was present in the store at the time.

Sainsbury’s also said at the time that there was no fault with the Facewatch technology.

The supermarket trialled the technology in two of its stores in September, which saw a 46 per cent reduction in logged incidents of theft, harm, aggression and anti-social behaviour.