France's Constitutional Council has given the all clear for Emmanuel Macron's government to continue with the law to deploy AI-powered video surveillance for major events such as the 2023 rugby union World Cup and the 2024 Paris Olympics and Paralympics.
The nine-member body, which adjudicates on constitutional issues, was asked to weigh up whether the Olympics security law – adopted by the Assemblée Nationale on 12 April – should be allowed to remain.
More than 60 opposition MPs called for the review of the new rules championed by the interior minister Gérald Darmanin and the sports minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra.
Critics insisted that the legislation allowing cameras – some on drones and aircraft – to feed algorithms alerting the authorities to potential dangers such as crowd surges or abandoned bags was too gross an intrusion into privacy.
"It seriously infringes on the fundamental freedoms to come and go, to demonstrate and to hold opinions," they claimed in their submission to the court.
But in a huge boost to the government, the court said Macron's ministers were trying to ensure public safety.
"In order to meet the constitutional objective of preventing breaches of public order, the legislator may authorise the algorithmic processing of images collected by means of a video protection system or cameras installed on aircraft," the council said.
Time
The new law will operate on an experimental basis at sporting, recreational or cultural events involving more than 300 people until 31 March 2025.
"The compliance of this measure with the constitution could then be examined again," said the Constitutional Council.
“This is going to be tested on concerts, festivals, races and the Rugby World Cup – so French people are going to be the guinea pigs to teach the algorithm,” Noémie Levain, a legal adviser at the digital rights group La Quadrature du Net, told RFI.
On Wednesday, the council also gave the green light for French anti-doping authorities to carry out the comparison of genetic fingerprints and the examination of the genetic characteristics of an athlete when trying to track down cheats.
The panel said that authorities will have to guarantee that when registering for the Olympic Games, athletes have sufficient information to ensure that they accept the possibility of being subjected to this type of test.
"The right to privacy requires particular vigilance in the analysis and processing of a person's genetic data," the council said.
