Of the forces in England and Wales that provided data for the study, 10 showed a disparity where black people were 10 times more likely to be strip-searched. Sussex police were 18 times more likely to subject a black person to a strip search.
The study by the Runnymede Trust analysed official data from the Home Office on the practice, under which people detained in police custody are told they must take off their clothes.
Black adults were 4.7 times more likely than white adults to be told they must strip, and black children are 6.5 times more likely than their white counterparts.
The data covers the year until March 2023 and the trust says the data is another example of institutional racism, which most forces deny exists.
The statistics showed that black people were more likely than white people to be strip-searched in all bar one of the forces included in the study. The exception was North Wales police, which did not use the tactic in the year examined, the last for which data is available.
Nearly half of strip-searches carried out on children in London were on black children, who comprise 16.9% of London’s child population.