Major NZ retailers sign up to use facial recognition technology

Wednesday, 11 June 2025

The Council of Civil Liberties said the Privacy Commissioner’s report would turn retailers on to using facial recogintion technology - and so it appears.

The Council for Civil Liberties turned out to be correct, and the Privacy Commissioner wrong, when the latter said just a week ago that its approval of a trial of facial recognition technology by Foodstuffs North Island was “not a green light for more general use”.

Today, the heads of Briscoes, Bunnings, Farmers, Mitre 10, Michael Hill, One NZ, Spark and The Warehouse have signed themselves up to support facial recognition technology (FRT) in their stores “to reduce harm and proactively combat retail crime”.

Bunnings has been banned from using facial recognition tech in Australia, but wants to use it in New Zealand.

Bunnings New Zealand has embraced the technology despite the use of the same technology in Bunnings Australia being knocked back by that country’s privacy commissioner.

The major retailers, under the banner of Retail New Zealand, said their teams faced high rates of verbal and physical abuse from repeat offenders who posed a risk to employees, customers and other visitors to our stores.

“They are often responsible for significant violence, stock loss or damage,” said Retail New Zealand head Carolyn Young.

Foodstuffs North Island, owner of Pak’n Save and other supermarkets, trialled the technology.

“We are firmly of the opinion that FRT, when used fairly and accurately, can be a valuable intervention to help keep customers and employees safe. It is a powerful and effective tool alongside other crime prevention resources such as security guards, fog cannons, staff training, body cameras, panic alarms, CCTV and other technology solutions.”

Last week the Privacy Commissioner issued a report into Foodstuffs North Island’s facial recognition trial in supermarkets. It said: “Sometimes facial recognition technology will self-evidently be effective to meet a specific lawful purpose,” but warned its report was “not a green light for more general use” of facial recognition technology.

The Council for Civil Liberties disagreed, saying inevitably more retailers would put in facial recognition camera systems, especially as they did not need to do trials because that had been done by Foodstuffs North Island, which operates the New World, Pak ‘n Save and FourSquare brands. The Foodstuffs trial, in 25 North Island supermarkets, scanned shoppers’ faces just over 225 million times between February and September last year.

A new retail crime report shows 99% of stores faced crime last year. With $2.7b in annual losses, facial recognition is being pitched as a key deterrent—but not without controversy.

Retail New Zealand today acknowledged Foodstuffs North Island for their “leadership in trialling this new technology, and also the oversight provided by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner in assessing FRT’s suitability for use in New Zealand.

“The trial clearly showed that the technology made a measurable impact in reducing crime, and improving safety in stores. A survey of 1000 New Zealanders found 89% support the use of FRT if it reduces harm by 10%,” Young said.

The retailers particularly supported the use of facial recognition technology to reduce the harm caused by what they called “recidivist offenders”. However, people considered to be in this category were already captured and their details held on private surveillance systems, including one made by Auror, which was widely used in retail. Some high profile cases have revealed a lot about the use, and occasional misuse, of these systems.

But Young said facial recognition technology offered the opportunity for retailers to to quickly identify individuals of interest as they enter the store: “Staff and/or security personnel are then able to respond quickly and decide how to manage each situation. Intervention is not required for every situation but FRT helps our teams to prevent or de-escalate incidents and offences.

“We recognise that technology must be used in a fair and accurate way. Guardrails are needed to support customers’ privacy, and to guard against potential bias and discrimination. We collectively make a commitment to work with Retail NZ to develop best practice to ensure FRT is used only to keep our people safe, and in line with our obligations under the Privacy Act.”