Algorithms, facial recognition, and tightening protest laws signal a deepening surveillance state
by Blade Runner
The UK is expanding its use of predictive policing and surveillance, framing it as a response to crime, protest, and public safety. But the direction is clear: more monitoring, earlier intervention, and more control over dissent.
In early April, The Guardian revealed that the Ministry of Justice is developing a “murder prevention” system. The tool aims to identify individuals judged to be at high risk of committing lethal violence, based on data drawn from multiple agencies—social care, policing, education. The government has framed the project as a research initiative to improve risk assessments and early intervention. But its underlying logic marks a shift toward ‘precrime’—managing individuals on the basis of what they might do, rather than what they’ve done.
The comparison to Minority Report—Philip K. Dick’s 1956 story, later adapted into a 2002 film—is hard to avoid. In both, people are flagged not by witnesses or evidence, but by prediction systems that turn patterns into verdicts. Dick’s vision included ‘precogs’—human oracles housed by the state—while today’s version relies on datasets and AI algorithms. In both, the future is treated as knowable, and the present is shaped around managing that future in advance.
Notably, overall crime rates in England and Wales have been falling for decades. According to the Office for National Statistics, incidents have dropped from nearly 20 million in the mid-1990s to under 5 million in recent years. Homicide levels have followed a similar decline, with 594 recorded in the year ending March 2021—far below their peak in the early 2000s. Only 35 of those involved firearms. The relative rarity of such violence raises questions about why a predictive “murder prevention” system is being pursued now.
At the same time, police forces face severe financial pressure. The Metropolitan Police is planning to cut 1,700 officers and staff to cover a £260 million budget gap. Other forces face similar cuts. But rather than scaling back, policing is being reorganised—away from visible presence and toward data-driven surveillance, algorithmic profiling, and anticipatory enforcement.
The Crime and Policing Bill 2025 reinforces this direction. It allows police to access DVLA-held driver licence records for law enforcement purposes. While the Home Office denies any link to facial recognition, civil liberties groups have raised concerns that this access could be repurposed—effectively turning the DVLA database into a foundation for real-time identification. Combined with surveillance networks already active in shops, housing estates, and transport hubs, this lays the groundwork for a more integrated system of biometric tracking, with limited transparency or oversight. These tools are disproportionately deployed in working-class areas and are consistently shown to disproportionately misidentify Black and Brown individuals.
In August 2024, following a series of racist attacks across England, Prime Minister Keir Starmer proposed the expanded use of live facial recognition technology (LFR) as part of the government’s response. Civil liberties groups, including Statewatch, condemned the move, warning that it would further entrench surveillance and racialised policing. In an open letter, over two dozen organisations argued that the UK risks becoming “an outlier in the democratic world” by embracing a technology with no explicit legal basis, widespread inaccuracy, and discriminatory impacts. Critics noted that the government’s response to racist violence focused not on addressing its causes, but on expanding state power over already over-policed communities.
The focus of policing is also shifting. As street crime continues to fall, more attention is directed toward protest, dissent, and the perceived risk of unrest. UK military operations abroad—most recently joint airstrikes in Yemen—raise the likelihood of retaliatory attacks. Surveillance systems originally developed for counter-terrorism are now being used to monitor social movements and suppress political disruption.
Recent protest laws support this shift. The Public Order Act and related legislation criminalise slow marches, locking-on, and disruption to infrastructure. These laws were drafted in response to climate protests from groups such as Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion. Often operating without strong ties to other struggles—like labour, housing or anti-racist organising—these campaigns were easier to isolate and criminalise. The resulting legal framework now stands ready for broader use.
The surveillance and predictive systems now being assembled are being designed not only for the current moment, but in preparation for what comes next. Whether in response to renewed austerity, military escalation, or widespread resistance, these tools are positioned to contain unrest before it surfaces. What’s emerging is a model of preemptive policing—structured around behaviour, association, and predicted risk. Individuals are reduced to data profiles, tracked not for what they’ve done but for their statistical proximity to disruption. Suppression is exercised in advance.
Risk scoring, biometric surveillance, and protest restrictions are being embedded into law and infrastructure. These powers are built to be extended—to trade unionists, migrant organisers, housing activists, and anyone seen to disrupt the smooth functioning of a society of control.
How the UK is shaping a future of Precrime and dissent management
From Freedom News (11/04/2025)
Algorithms, facial recognition, and tightening protest laws signal a deepening surveillance state
by Blade Runner
The UK is expanding its use of predictive policing and surveillance, framing it as a response to crime, protest, and public safety. But the direction is clear: more monitoring, earlier intervention, and more control over dissent.
In early April, The Guardian revealed that the Ministry of Justice is developing a “murder prevention” system. The tool aims to identify individuals judged to be at high risk of committing lethal violence, based on data drawn from multiple agencies—social care, policing, education. The government has framed the project as a research initiative to improve risk assessments and early intervention. But its underlying logic marks a shift toward ‘precrime’—managing individuals on the basis of what they might do, rather than what they’ve done.
The comparison to Minority Report—Philip K. Dick’s 1956 story, later adapted into a 2002 film—is hard to avoid. In both, people are flagged not by witnesses or evidence, but by prediction systems that turn patterns into verdicts. Dick’s vision included ‘precogs’—human oracles housed by the state—while today’s version relies on datasets and AI algorithms. In both, the future is treated as knowable, and the present is shaped around managing that future in advance.
Notably, overall crime rates in England and Wales have been falling for decades. According to the Office for National Statistics, incidents have dropped from nearly 20 million in the mid-1990s to under 5 million in recent years. Homicide levels have followed a similar decline, with 594 recorded in the year ending March 2021—far below their peak in the early 2000s. Only 35 of those involved firearms. The relative rarity of such violence raises questions about why a predictive “murder prevention” system is being pursued now.
At the same time, police forces face severe financial pressure. The Metropolitan Police is planning to cut 1,700 officers and staff to cover a £260 million budget gap. Other forces face similar cuts. But rather than scaling back, policing is being reorganised—away from visible presence and toward data-driven surveillance, algorithmic profiling, and anticipatory enforcement.
The Crime and Policing Bill 2025 reinforces this direction. It allows police to access DVLA-held driver licence records for law enforcement purposes. While the Home Office denies any link to facial recognition, civil liberties groups have raised concerns that this access could be repurposed—effectively turning the DVLA database into a foundation for real-time identification. Combined with surveillance networks already active in shops, housing estates, and transport hubs, this lays the groundwork for a more integrated system of biometric tracking, with limited transparency or oversight. These tools are disproportionately deployed in working-class areas and are consistently shown to disproportionately misidentify Black and Brown individuals.
In August 2024, following a series of racist attacks across England, Prime Minister Keir Starmer proposed the expanded use of live facial recognition technology (LFR) as part of the government’s response. Civil liberties groups, including Statewatch, condemned the move, warning that it would further entrench surveillance and racialised policing. In an open letter, over two dozen organisations argued that the UK risks becoming “an outlier in the democratic world” by embracing a technology with no explicit legal basis, widespread inaccuracy, and discriminatory impacts. Critics noted that the government’s response to racist violence focused not on addressing its causes, but on expanding state power over already over-policed communities.
The focus of policing is also shifting. As street crime continues to fall, more attention is directed toward protest, dissent, and the perceived risk of unrest. UK military operations abroad—most recently joint airstrikes in Yemen—raise the likelihood of retaliatory attacks. Surveillance systems originally developed for counter-terrorism are now being used to monitor social movements and suppress political disruption.
Recent protest laws support this shift. The Public Order Act and related legislation criminalise slow marches, locking-on, and disruption to infrastructure. These laws were drafted in response to climate protests from groups such as Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion. Often operating without strong ties to other struggles—like labour, housing or anti-racist organising—these campaigns were easier to isolate and criminalise. The resulting legal framework now stands ready for broader use.
The surveillance and predictive systems now being assembled are being designed not only for the current moment, but in preparation for what comes next. Whether in response to renewed austerity, military escalation, or widespread resistance, these tools are positioned to contain unrest before it surfaces. What’s emerging is a model of preemptive policing—structured around behaviour, association, and predicted risk. Individuals are reduced to data profiles, tracked not for what they’ve done but for their statistical proximity to disruption. Suppression is exercised in advance.
Risk scoring, biometric surveillance, and protest restrictions are being embedded into law and infrastructure. These powers are built to be extended—to trade unionists, migrant organisers, housing activists, and anyone seen to disrupt the smooth functioning of a society of control.