Mumbai Railways Installing Thousands of Facial Recognition Cameras

Indian Railways is planning to install thousands of CCTV cameras equipped with facial recognition across greater Mumbai in an effort to boost security.

The project is worth 890 million rupees (US$10.6 million) and is partially bankrolled by the Nirbhaya Fund, dedicated to enhancing women’s safety in the country.

A total of 6,122 cameras will be deployed to 364 railway stations operated by the Central Railway, a part of Indian Railways. Of them, around 3,652 will feature facial recognition technology and will be strategically placed across 117 vital railway stations, Central Railways spokesperson Shivraj Manaspure told Free Press Journal.

“This introduction of 4K-enabled cameras is anticipated to revolutionize railway security,” says Manaspure.

The Nirbhaya (“Fearless”) Fund was set up by the Indian government after the 2012 Delhi gang rape, which sparked widespread protests across India against gender-based violence. The fund has invested its largest slice of funding, around 29.2 billion rupees (US$350.8 million), into Safe City initiatives across eight metropolitan areas.

The Central Railway did not share the companies involved in the project. The company carries 400,000 passengers every day across the state of Maharashtra and parts of Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh.

In 2021, facial recognition company NtechLab announced it would be supplying Indian Railways with its technology in railway stations across Gujarat and Maharashtra.

Source: Biometric Update

Masha Borak is a technology journalist. Her work has appeared in Wired, Business Insider, Rest of World, and other media outlets. Previously she reported for the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong. Reach out to her at [email protected].

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