In his classic novel, 1984, George Orwell imagined how Britain might one day become a totalitarian surveillance state.
Yet as Orwell’s novel celebrates its 75th anniversary this month, British police are already deploying technologies that would put Big Brother to shame.
From the facial recognition cameras watching you shop to the algorithms predicting crimes before they happen, these tools feel as if they’ve been ripped from the pages of science fiction.
But there is nothing fictional about the AI cops