Hong Kong Expanding to 60,000 AI-Powered Surveillance Cameras by 2028: Security vs Privacy Concerns

Security officials in Hong Kong have announced plans to deploy 60,000 surveillance cameras equipped with AI facial recognition technology across the city, according to statements made on Friday.

The city's security chief, Chris Tang, confirmed that artificial intelligence capabilities will be expanded from current applications in crowd monitoring and license plate reading to include tracking individuals, particularly criminal suspects. "That is something we must do," Tang emphasized while speaking to lawmakers.

Currently, Hong Kong has installed nearly 4,000 CCTV cameras as part of the police SmartView crime-fighting initiative. According to documents submitted to the legislature, this number will increase more than fifteen-fold by 2028.

Police authorities defend the surveillance expansion as essential for national security and crime prevention. They attribute the existing camera network with successfully resolving over 400 cases and facilitating 787 arrests since the program launched last year.

According to the South China Morning Post, law enforcement officers may begin utilizing real-time facial recognition capabilities "as early as the end of this year."

This technological approach mirrors surveillance systems widely deployed throughout mainland China, where public spaces are frequently monitored using advanced recognition technologies.

While similar surveillance technology has been implemented in countries like Britain, critics raise significant concerns about potential privacy invasions on a massive scale and the risk of false matches leading to wrongful arrests.

The European Union addressed such concerns in its Artificial Intelligence Act last year, which generally prohibits "real-time remote biometric identification systems in publicly accessible spaces for law enforcement purposes," though certain exceptions exist.

Hong Kong's privacy watchdog, an independent statutory body, declined to comment on whether it had been consulted regarding the expansion of the surveillance camera program.