With retail crime continuing to soar, UK retailers are rolling out more anti-theft technology than ever.

Sainsbury’s has now joined the ranks, beginning an eight-week trial of facial recognition technology in two of its stores to identify serious offenders.

Meanwhile, supermarket chains have started introducing VAR-style cameras at their self-checkouts, with Lidl joining Tesco in launching the tech at two of its London stores last month to identify when items had not been scanned.

Asda and Iceland also became the latest retailers to install facial recognition across some of their supermarkets this year to tackle the rise in shoplifting and violence against store workers.

The use of these types of measures have created controversy, with campaign group Big Brother Watch describing the tech as “chilling” and “Orwellian”.

With shoplifting still soaring, it raises the question of whether retailers’ “dystopian” anti-theft measures actually work to prevent crime.

Tackling rising retail crime

The number of shoplifting offences in England and Wales hit 530,643 for the year ending March 2025, rising 20% from 444,022 the same time last year, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) reported.

A survey of almost 10,000 retail workers by trade union Usdaw in March found that 70% had experienced verbal abuse over the last year, while 46% had been threatened by a customer and 18% had been assaulted.

Asda reported that more than 1,400 incidents of assault took place against its store colleagues last year – an average of four per day.

Meanwhile, Co-op, which has over 2,500 c-stores across the UK, revealed that it faced an average of 1,000 incidents of shoplifting, abuse, violence or anti-social behaviour each day last year – up 44% from the year before.

The surge in retail crime has been driven by various factors, such as the cost of living crisis, organised crime groups and a lack of police response to incidents.

Last year, figures from Sky News found fewer than one in four shoplifting incidents were attended to by police officers in 2023. 

In addition, last year Co-op said police failed to attend 79% of incidents where a criminal had been detained in its stores during 2023. 

As such, retailers are increasingly taking matters into their own hands with the roll out of body-cameras and fortified kiosks – even going as far as to install facial recognition and “checkout VAR” in its stores.

Lidl followed Tesco in installing overhead cameras at its self-checkouts in two of its London supermarkets, which plays back a live-action recording of missed scans before allowing shoppers to pay.

While Iceland installed facial recognition cameras, powered by Facewatch, at two of its shops in June ahead of a wider planned rollout.

The technology works by using a specialist camera to scan people’s faces as they enter the shop, and then checks for a match on a database of “subjects of interest”, who are deemed to have previously committed a crime, according to The Grocer.

It follows Asda, which partnered with FaiceTech in March to roll out the technology across its Ashton, Chadderton, Eastlands, Harpurhey and Trafford Park supermarkets.

Home Bargains, Sports Direct and Southern Co-op are among other retailers to have implemented facial recognition tech into their operations. The use of the technology by retailers is not particularly new, with The Guardian reporting in 2016 that an estimated 59% of UK fashion retailers were using it the year prior.

Striking the right balance

However, not everybody is happy with these technological methods to prevent shoplifting.

Big Brother Watch is one organisation that has been vocal in speaking out against facial recognition tech used by retailers to prevent crime in the UK.

The group condemned Asda’s live facial recognition trial across five of its Greater Manchester stores and Iceland’s plans as “deeply disproportionate and chilling”.

The group’s senior advocacy officer Madeleine Stone says: “We have serious concerns about the use particularly of live facial recognition but also general biometric surveillance in shops because of the serious implications for privacy and the risk of it going wrong and making mistakes.”

Highlighting privacy concerns with the practice, she also explains: “The way that facial recognition technology works is by scanning and seeking to identify every single person who walks into a shop.

“So that’s a biometric face check, which is something you see at a passport security booth or immigration services being deployed for something as ordinary as buying a pint of milk.”

Civil liberties organisation Liberty is another group that is campaigning against the use of facial recognition tech by retailers.

In May, its policy and campaigns officer Charlie Whelton argued: “The UK is massively behind in regulating facial recognition technology, especially compared to Europe and the US where limits have already been put in place.”

Asda chair Allan Leighton defended the use of facial recognition at its Greater Manchester stores in May, saying that protecting staff was a top priority.

“We have on an average four or five assaults on our colleagues every day, and that is unacceptable. We will do whatever we need to do, within the law, that enables that number to come down,” he said at the time.

However, online retail consultant Martin Newman argues that these technologies “risk alienating customers and eroding trust” if they are rolled out “without transparency, empathy, and strong governance”.

“The balance lies in how the technology is explained, how privacy is respected, and how fairly it’s used,” he says.

PwC senior retail adviser Kien Tan says retailers will have to use “trial and error” to get the balance right in ensuring its anti-theft measures don’t deter customers.

“What we’re living in is almost a live simulation of different ways of doing it. I don’t think there’s a solution yet but they’re trying different ways to find out,” he says.

He argues that tech like facial recognition and checkout VAR is “not the major decision” as to why shoppers choose stores.

“There may be people who might be momentarily irritated by it and people who will choose, for example in the VAR situation, not to use self-checkouts, but in general they’re choosing not to use self-checkouts for other reasons,” he says.

Conversely, Stone says: “There’s no evidence to suggest [facial recognition] is having a serious impact on the types of crimes that are happening in shops.

“There’s no independent verification. Obviously various companies will be promoting their technology, and they’ll want to make certain claims, but it’s very difficult to really have any kind of independent verification of that.”

Do the measures actually work?

Whether you are for or against the current anti-theft measures in retail, there’s one big question to answer: do they actually prevent crime?

Newman says facial recognition is not a “silver bullet” for tackling shoplifting, but it may deter “some repeat offenders”.

“While tech can play a role in identifying known offenders, it’s vital that it’s used responsibly and alongside other efforts, like better training for staff, greater in-store presence, and improved collaboration between retailers, law enforcement, and community services,” he says.

In 2023, Facewatch reported that overall crime year on year saw a 1.4% increase in stores where its technology was present, compared to a 44.1% rise in stores without its system.

Additionally, in July 2024, a Morrisons Daily store in Northampton, using the tech, said its crime had fallen by 90% since being installed in January 2023.

In February, Poundland also reported a drop in violence and theft across its stores after giving body cameras to its staff, with the retailer witnessing an 11% fall in incidents of violence against staff since its pilot program.

Likewise, in August 2024 it was reported that Holland & Barrett’s million-pound investment into new anti-theft tech across its estate over the year helped it identify more than 600 repeat offenders.

It certainly doesn’t look like anti-theft tech measures are going anywhere soon, raising the question of what could come next as technology continues to advance.

Retail Technology Magazine publisher Miya Knights highlights Amazon’s just walk out technology, which works by using a mix of computer vision, sensors and AI to track what shoppers pick up and then automatically charges them when they leave, with no checkout process needed.

“I think it’s genius that as a side benefit, the technology kind of just eliminates shrink (retail shrinkage caused by external theft). If you walk out of the store having tucked a product under your jumper, you get charged for it,” she says.

However, Knights notes that the reason we’ve not seen similar technology become more widespread is because “it’s just too expensive”.

“As the cost of equipping a store of a reasonable size with this type of technology comes down to a lower price than a self checkout system, I think we will see a shift.”

Newman also says: “We’re likely to see more AI-powered surveillance, behavioural analytics, and even predictive monitoring based on movement or sentiment.

“Smart shelves, autonomous security drones, and biometric checkout systems could all become more common.”

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