Vendors and modelsDeployer
Metropolitan Police Service AI failures
Every documented AI failure involving Metropolitan Police Service on the AI Failure Index, classified by the mechanism that broke.
- Failures
- 2
- Highest severity
- High
- Span
- 2017 to 2024
- Failure modes
- 1
Metropolitan Police facial recognition trial at Notting Hill Carnival reports 98 percent error rate
The Metropolitan Police Service deployed live facial recognition technology during the 2017 Notting Hill Carnival. An audit later revealed that the system incorrectly identified the vast majority of potential matches.
- Confidence
- High (multi-source, primary)
Met Police facial recognition wrongly matched youth worker Shaun Thompson
In February 2024 Shaun Thompson, a youth advocacy worker, was stopped and questioned after the Metropolitan Police's live facial‑recognition system matched him to a watchlist entry. The encounter lasted around 30 minutes and ended when Thompson produced ID; he subsequently brought a High Court challenge to the Met's use of LFR, which was dismissed on 2026-04-21. Reporting on the case is documented by multiple independent outlets including the BBC and The Independent.
- Confidence
- Medium (multi-source)
See how Realm catches these failure modes at runtime, before they reach production.
Book a Demo