Macau wants to install face-recognition video surveillance cameras

The Government of Macao announced today its intention to install facial recognition video surveillance cameras in the territory next year, one of the Executive’s efforts to reinforce policing through new technologies.

The announcement was made by Secretary for Security Wong Sio Chak on the first day of the LAG debate for the financial year 2019 in the Security area of ​​the Legislative Assembly of Macao.

Facial recognition cameras should be installed mainly at border posts, according to the official. Since 2016, 800 video surveillance cameras have been installed in public areas of the city. By 2020, an additional 800 should be installed, he said.

Wong Sio Chak, however, rejected a suggestion to extend facial recognition to casinos, stating that “police can not install this type of chambers in casinos, only in public areas.”

“As for the recording of images we can ask the casinos for a collaboration, but that depends on the concessionaires,” he added.

In 2012, the Legislative Assembly of Macao approved the legal framework for video surveillance in public spaces, which authorizes the capture of images that can be used as evidence in criminal proceedings or in traffic violations.

At the same time, Wong Sio Chak announced that a data sharing service will be created in 2019 between all security forces and services.

“The intercommunication of data is very important … What we want with this system is to prevent crimes or to anticipate the occurrence of crimes and to safeguard public order,” he said.

Intelligent policing is one of the issues that dominates the LAG document in the area of ​​security, not surprising, since the reform of the traditional model of policing has long been addressed by that guardianship.

In this regard, and according to the LAGs, the Government will evaluate the internal police regime in China, “in particular with regard to technical standards adapted to the liberalization, management and maintenance of areas related to cybersecurity, migration control, civil defense, counter-terrorism and the DNA database. ”

Security at the border posts, one month after the opening of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau bridge, was also one of the topics of the discussion, which was not completed today.

the president again stressed the lack of resources and the need to hire more people to the border posts.

At the end of October, Executive Council spokesman Leong Heng Teng announced that Macao should have security 24 hours a day at the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau border post but that “it needed more folks”.

At the beginning of next year, the Government will implement the “Ten-Year Plan for Disaster Prevention and Reduction (2019-2028)“, the Security Minister said.

Macao was the scene in less than two years of two typhoons that forced the authorities to raise the signal 10 of tropical storm, the maximum in the alert scale.

In September, Mankhut caused direct and indirect economic losses of 1.55 billion patacas (170.77 million euros) in Macau, according to government estimates.

Last year, typhoon Hato, although characterized by the same intensity of Mangkhut, had made 10 dead, more than 240 injured and losses valued at 12.55 billion patacas (1.3 billion euros).