The Challenge
Phoenix Community Housing, a resident-led housing association in South London, manages over 6,000 homes and maintains an extensive archive of more than 900,000 images. These images, distributed across numerous drives and folders, are essential for property management and documentation. However, the manual process of identifying images containing faces or people—a critical step for GDPR compliance—was burdensome, time-consuming, and increasingly unsustainable due to a monthly influx of thousands of new images. Without an automated solution, staff faced mounting compliance risks and operational inefficiencies.
The Solution
Recognising the need to modernise and secure its photo archive, Phoenix Community Housing engaged Crimson for support. Crimson’s deep sector expertise and status as a Microsoft Gold Partner made them a trusted choice. After assessing several options, Phoenix selected Crimson’s custom application built on Microsoft Azure Cognitive Services. This automated solution was designed to identify and classify images, with specific focus on detecting photos containing faces or people to ensure GDPR compliance.
Reflecting on the collaboration, Mike Wooderson, Business Analyst at Phoenix Community Housing, shared: “The Crimson team demonstrated great knowledge and experience of the technology, and developed a really effective solution for us. Thank you to Crimson for their responsiveness, expertise and technical support.” The deployment of this Azure-powered application allowed Phoenix to efficiently manage and secure its growing photo archive, automating a previously manual and error-prone process.
The Results
Since implementing Crimson’s Azure-based solution, Phoenix Community Housing has seen transformative results. The process for identifying, classifying, and managing images containing faces is now automated, significantly reducing the time and resources required for GDPR compliance. With over 900,000 images processed, and thousands more added every month, staff can focus on higher-value tasks, confident in the security and compliance of their photo archive.
