Misidentified Asian man falsely arrested after facial recognition error

Alvi Choudhury, a 26-year-old software engineer from Southampton, was wrongfully arrested for burglary in January after retrospective facial recognition (RFR) software misidentified him as a suspect 100 miles away in Milton Keynes. The technology, which searches against around 19 million police images held on the Police National Database (PND), mistakenly suggested Choudhury's identity matched that of a significantly younger person. Choudhury, who has a beard, expressed his disbelief at the arrest, highlighting the suspect's noticably different features. Despite providing evidence of his whereabouts during the crime, and that interviewing officers knew he wasnt the suspect, he was still detained for almost 10 hours. 

He is now pursuing damages against Thames Valley police and Hampshire Constabulary as well as calling for greater transparency regarding wrongful arrests linked to facial recognition technology. Choudhury expressed his frustrations with facial recognition technology, noting that previous encounters with law enforcement had already complicated his professional life. An internal review acknowledged possible bias in the technology, but Thames Valley Police maintain that the arrest decision involved a human visual assessment. Choudhury's lawyer has urged the police to ensure that intelligence from AI is used responsibly alongside human judgment to prevent further incidents.

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