‘Facial recognition is everywhere in China and people seem OK with it’

Female customer using facial recognition technology

Returning to China, Retail Week analyst Hanna Hua shares her experience of how technology such as facial recognition, payments and robots is transforming shopping. Can such dramatic change be expected in the UK?

A few weeks ago I was able to return to China, where I’m from, for the first time since before Covid hit in 2019.

I didn’t go to Beijing or Shanghai, but in all the places I visited the pace of change in retail technology over just a few years was astonishing.

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