Paris 2024 Olympics: Senators mostly pass security-focused bill

The Senate on Tuesday, January 31, passed with a large majority the Olympic Bill on the Paris 2024 Olympic Games (OG), which is very focused on security and protests from communists and environmentalists.

This text, which was voted by 245 votes to 28, specifically authorizes the so-called cameras. “magnified” Allows algorithms to detect crowd movement. It is considered in an accelerated manner, that is, in one reading in the Senate and the Assembly.

This law comes months after the Champions League final fiasco at the Stade de France in late May 2022. Spectators climbing the gates without tickets, ticket holders locked at the entrance, families being tear-gassed by the police or even theft and assault: the final turned into a nightmare.

Detection of suspicious movements

The Paris Olympics, which are expected to attract 13 million spectators and around 600,000 people to the opening ceremony on the banks of the Seine on July 26, 2024, will use cameras to detect suspicious movements in the crowd, authorities say.

Both around the contents and in the surrounding transport, they will also be able to detect “abandoned objects”or allow it “For example, statistical analysis of traffic flows”According to the law’s impact study.

Another security measure: body scanners, which could partially replace the lack of bodyguards, especially women, that everyone expects.

Experimentation with these new tools will be possible after the entry into force of the law, but also for demonstration purposes “recreational” and “cultural”. The text was drafted by the government following the conclusion of the National Commission on Computing and Freedoms and the Council of State.