Description
This is a turning point for the police in London. We are setting out how we will significantly step up our use of technology to fundamentally change how we protect the public.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, warned that policing today will fail if it is not allowed to keep pace with criminals through technology. That this is not a prediction for the distant future. It is a present reality.
Crime is evolving at speed. Criminals are organised, networked and digital. They are using smarter, faster and more connected tools than ever before.
Criminals do not have to play by any rules. They do not care about protecting your data, they actively seek to exploit it. They are not constrained by governance, or procurement rules.
Delivered at the ArcelorMittal Orbit in London’s Olympic Park on Wednesday 24 June 2026 in partnership with The Police Foundation, Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley set out how the police will regain and retain the advantage from the criminals. This speech also reflects on the barriers to progress, and the opportunities that must be seized to take the transformative leap.
Learning from nearly 200 years of policing in London, the case for change and the evolving nature of crime, the Commissioner highlighted the rising public expectations of a modern police service and that investment in infrastructure is not enough.
The police are already embracing new technologies: Artificial Intelligence (AI) video analytics, Drones and Live Facial Recognition (LFR). Data integration and data exploitation can unlock precise, accelerated investigations. We have over 2,200 datasets across more than 600 systems, 3.4 million body worn video recordings downloaded in the last 12 months, and we are making 250,000 forensic submissions in a single year. Can you imagine if we could connect all of this data to spot patterns at the touch of a button?
Technology is not just reducing crime. It is building trust. Officers and staff will remain at the heart of every decision. What this approach does is equip good people with better tools. It does not mean abandoning ethics, quite the opposite. It means strengthening them.
There will be human oversight underpinned by clear values and accountability at every stage. We agree with Londoners that AI should support, not make decisions.
You can see our determination to regain the advantage over criminals and we have been clear on the help we need to keep pace.
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