Australia’s two largest supermarket chains, Coles and Woolworths, have disclosed that they conducted trials of facial recognition technology with potential application across their store networks. The companies indicated the technology could help address retail crime and aggression directed at employees, though both stated they had not finalized decisions regarding broader implementation.
Privacy advocates and technology experts have expressed significant concerns about the development. Marketing researcher Dr Jason Pallant from RMIT University characterized the proposal as presenting a fundamental “security versus privacy dilemma,” noting that widespread deployment would require all supermarket visitors to accept facial scanning. Digital Rights Watch policy director Tom Sulston described the technology as “wildly inaccurate” and questioned whether ordinary shoppers should compromise privacy to access essential goods. Researchers have documented that facial recognition systems exhibit higher error rates when identifying people of color compared to white individuals.
The supermarket initiative follows an Administrative Review Tribunal decision that permitted Bunnings to continue using facial recognition technology. The tribunal had reversed a prior ruling by the privacy commissioner but acknowledged that Bunnings had failed to adequately notify customers about face scanning. Facial recognition systems function by capturing images from video cameras and converting them into digital faceprints that can be compared against watchlists of banned or aggressive individuals.
Coles characterized its testing as a limited “proof-of-concept” that did not involve actual customer or employee data, while Woolworths indicated it had conducted trials at its New Zealand offices and attributed continued testing to documented incidents of workplace aggression. Dr Luke Munn from the University of Queensland expressed concern that initial security justifications could enable broader surveillance normalization within critical retail infrastructure. The technology represents another phase in supermarket deployment of automated systems, following adoption of anti-theft gates and self-service checkout technology.
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