Hertfordshire’s ‘ring of steel’ cameras ‘unlawful’, says ICO

Hertfordshire Constabulary has been told to review its use of automatic numberplate recognition (ANPR) cameras around the town of Royston.

The force has been issued with an enforcement notice by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) after it deemed the collection of information by the so-called ‘ring of steel’ around the town – which it claims has effectively meant anyone driving in or out has had his or her details recorded – unlawful and excessive.

The town was chosen due to its proximity to key arterial routes through the county – namely the A10 and A505.

The ICO found the force breached principle one and principle three of the Data Protection Act 1988 and had failed to carry out effective impact assessments before installing the cameras and therefore was unable to satisfactorily justify their use.

Hertfordshire Constabulary will now have to cease processing people’s information in this way unless it undergoes a proper privacy impact assessment that rules the scheme viable.

The ICO’s head of enforcement, Stephen Eckersley, said ANPR had to be proportionate and hoped police forces would bear this in mind when devising these schemes.

“It is difficult to see why a small rural town such as Royston requires cameras monitoring all traffic in and out of the town 24 hours a day,” he said.

“The use of ANPR cameras and other forms of surveillance must be proportionate to the problem it is trying to address. After detailed enquiries, including consideration of the information Hertfordshire Constabulary provided, we found that this simply was not the case in Royston.

“We hope that this enforcement notice sends a clear message to all police forces that the use of ANPR cameras needs to be fully justified before they are installed. This includes carrying out a comprehensive assessment of the impact on the privacy of the road using public.”

The constabulary accepted the ICO’s findings, adding it welcomed the decision to call for additional work on privacy impact assessments rather than prohibiting the Royston installation.

“We have already undertaken considerable analysis of the justification for the use of these cameras in Royston and we have welcomed the commissioner’s offer of further advice on strengthening our privacy impact assessments,” a spokesperson said.

“The constabulary takes very seriously its obligations under the Data Protection Act 1998 and Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. We share the ICO’s view that ANPR cameras should be used only on justifiable grounds.”

They added that the constabulary intends to continue using ANPR cameras, “which deliver very substantial policing benefits”, but will also ensure “that its particular deployment of such cameras is – and is seen to be – fully justified”.

The ICO’s investigation was prompted by a joint complaint from privacy groups Big Brother Watch, Privacy International and No CCTV following the ANPR installation around Royston in 2011.

In June, speaking at the University of Hertfordshire’s ANPR conference, Hertfordshire Constabulary’s director of intelligence, Detective Superintendent Paul Ealham, said the use of ANPR “has never been under so much scrutiny” and that the service should strive to ensure that it is used “in a measured, appropriate and effective way”.