Back in March, CCTV Image revealed that research undertaken by Graeme Gerrard, the Deputy Chief Constable of Cheshire and lead on CCTV issues for the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), there are 1.85 million CCTV cameras in the UK, not the 4.2 million claimed by a 2002 paper published by Michael McCahill and Clive Norris, who arrived at their figure by counting the number of devices on a busy mile-long shopping street.

As part of an initiative to help investigating officers to locate CCTV evidence more effectively, Police Community Support Officers throughout Cheshire visited businesses to collect information about the locations, types, image retention and use of closed circuit television systems.

Extrapolation of their information led them to an estimated figure of about 1.7 million privately owned CCTV cameras in the UK to which they added the 33,433 local authority cameras and another 115,000 of cameras out on the street.

1.85 million cameras works out at one CCTV camera for every 32 citizens.