Police Progress Slow on Changing Practices of Illegally Photographing People
December 23, 2022
PHOTO: Pixabay
The police are a long way off completing the reforms they started after a damning inquiry into their practice of photographing the public, including children.
The latest quarterly stocktake shows some progress, but at the halfway point there remains a significant amount of work to do ahead of the December 2023 deadline.
Police say they are going as fast as they can.
Earlier this year a joint investigation by two watchdogs found officers were routinely and illegally photographing and filming young people and adults.
The Independent Police Conduct Authority (IPCA) and the Office of the Privacy Commission (OPC) launched their investigation after RNZ reporting which showed the practice appeared to be widespread.
The inquiry found systemic problems with the way police take, store, and use people’s private biometric information.
The new update, released earlier this week, shows of the 23 recommendations from the joint inquiry, 21 remain in the earliest stage of completion - and only two have been finished.
Only six of the 14 specific changes required from the OPC enforcement action (more on what that means below) have been completed.
Six are still at the earliest stage of work, while better progress is being made in two areas.
Police remain in the earliest stages of coming up with a consolidated and comprehensive policy for how to lawfully take photographs of the public for intelligence and investigative purposes.