Facial recognition technology is now capable of identifying individuals even when they're in a crowd. Photo/123RF.
Facial recognition cameras at a sports stadium led to the arrest of a fugitive at a Jacky Cheung concert in China, making it the third time in two months that the technology was used to catch a wanted person there.
A man identified by the surname Yu was flagged among
a crowd of 20,000 concertgoers after passing through security at the Jiaxing Sports Center Stadium, in Zhejiang, an eastern coastal province, according to the South China Morning Post.
Yu has been under investigation since 2015, for allegedly stealing more than US$17,000 (NZ$24,500) worth of potatoes, the report said. After entering the stadium, police were alerted to his presence. "A few minutes after he passed through the security checkpoint, our system issued a warning that he was a wanted person," Shen Yueguang, an official from the Nanhu District Public Security Bureau said, according to Qianjiang Evening News.
Yu, who had been living under a pseudonym, was arrested by police as he was leaving the concert, the South China Morning Post said. But if Yu thought that a crowd of thousands of Cheung fans would offer anonymity, he wouldn't be the first suspect in China to have gotten that wrong.
Last month, a man wanted for "economic crimes" was arrested in Jiangxi province in southeast China after facial recognition cameras detected his presence at a Cheung concert attended by 60,000 people. Another man at a Cheung event in Fujian province was taken in by police earlier this month, according to the South China Morning Post.
