Czech Police

The Office for Personal Data Protection's inspection of the police (file UOOU-03154/23, listed among its inspections for 2024) describes the information system 'Digitální podoba osob' (IS DPO), which the police use to help identify unknown persons of interest in criminal proceedings, such as suspects, witnesses or victims, by automated facial recognition against photographs from the identity card and travel document registers. The Office found that section 66a of the Police Act does not set sufficiently foreseeable conditions for the processing of biometric data in IS DPO, that the police's data protection impact assessment met the legal requirements despite shortcomings, and that the police breached their duty to request prior consultation before starting the processing. The page mentions no sanction or corrective order. In a statement of 20 July 2023, reported by Advokátní deník on 24 July 2023, the police said the system had been available since August 2022 in trial operation ("zkušební provoz"), restricted to specially trained staff at the Police Presidium and used retrospectively in serious cases and to identify deceased persons, not in real time. Novinky (12 August 2023) reported the police describing a one-year testing regime. Lupa.cz (4 October 2023) reported that the Ministry of the Interior upheld Iuridicum Remedium's appeal for information about the system, and put the reference database at almost 20 million faces from identity cards and passports. The sources date from 2023 and 2024; none says whether the trial ended or the system moved into routine operation.