Macau casino operator Melco Crown steps up security against banned customers with facial recognition technology

As revenues continue to fall and gamblers accumulate debts, a Macau gaming operator has decided to step up security measures in an attempt to stop banned people from entering in its casinos.

Melco Crown, headed by chief executive and co-chairman Lawrence Ho Yau-lung, is the first casino operator in Asia’s gaming hub installing a specialised face recognition technology developed by German biometric firm Cognitec.

The system, called FaceVACS-VideoScan, detects people’s faces in live video streams and compare their facial features with photos of banned persons stored in databases.

But this technology goes beyond that: if there’s a match between the information collected and the photos in the system, it sends real-time alerts to security staff. The aim is to prevent losses and criminal activities.

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According to Cognitec, the software also allows to compute demographical information, client behaviour, people movement in time and space, and frequent visitors.