Nottinghamshire Police are to deploy facial recognition technology to identify criminals and safeguard vulnerable people.

It will be deployed via a marked police van, which has a 360-degree dual camera system.

A watchlist will be created for those suspected of serious crimes and the tech will alert officers when it identifies one of the individuals on the list.

Officers will then engage with those identified to assess whether further action is needed.

Detective Superintendent Will Henley said: "If you aren’t entering the city or county to commit crime then you have nothing to worry about. This new technology is not interested in tracking your movements.

"This technology is designed to identify those faces we have inputted into the system who are wanted for crimes or in need of safeguarding such as locating missing people.

"The technology will always be used fairly and proportionately to the area it is deployed.

"This will not replace police officers. This technology will work with them to ensure we have the best chance of identifying those causing the most harm to your local community.

"It will be the police officers who make the decision not the technology on the next actions to take. This is very much an intelligence tool.

"To reassure the community, as we know the technology has raised concerns in other parts of the country, the software erases every facial scan within seconds if no match is identified, so nothing is retained.

"Our view is very simple - why would we not use this innovative technology to find offenders and protect the public from becoming potential victims of crime?"