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Police Cars To Transmit Real-Time Video
Posted by
Soulskill
on Sat Nov 22, 2008 11:18 AM
from the aka-donut-shop-webcam dept.
from the aka-donut-shop-webcam dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "In the first such system deployed in the country, police vehicles in Ponca City, Oklahoma will have wireless video cameras installed so precinct dispatchers and supervisors can monitor activities during traffic stops in real time, and quickly deploy additional officers and resources if necessary. The system to provide an added level of monitoring and protection for its force is part of a broadband mesh network comprised of more than 490 wireless nodes and gateways connected to 120 miles of fiber backbone that will provide coverage for approximately 30 square miles of the city. The network will provide field communications for city services including police, fire and emergency, parks and recreation, public works and energy, but will also be used to provide free wireless internet access for all residents of the city. 'The testing of this network showed that it was robust enough to handle not only municipal traffic, but also citizens' traffic.' said Mayor Homer Nicholson. 'So the Ponca City Board of Commissioners voted to allow the extra internet access to be given to the citizens of Ponca City for free.' The second phase of the project will expand the network and wireless coverage to more than 430 square miles surrounding the city with an estimated annual cost savings of over $1 million for city residents, who can discontinue their existing internet service. 'Our goal is to be one of the most mobile communities in America, and this is a significant step in that direction,' said Nicholson."
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Fine, Just Fine... (Score:5, Interesting)
I say this is a good thing, but we shouldn't stop there. I'd say everyone's car should have [hidden] video cameras...
Anything that happens on public ground, especially involving public servants (i.e. police), should be considered to be recorded by the public. Privacy in public is an outdated concept, and has never truly existed anyways (so give it up). Someone will be watching -- the question is, is everyone watching, or is it a one-sided situation (like the CCTV system in the UK)?
Events taking place on public ground should never come down to "his word vs. mine." In cases where this involves police, then the police officers' word is always given more credit than the citizens'. Now while this is probably a reasonable bias to have, it neglects the fact that police officers are just humans too, and are themselves just as influenced by biases as anyone else. Video recordings have no bias...
This is essentially becoming a reality, especially considering that most everyone's phone has a camera. Let's see what happens the next time there is an instance of abuse of authority, say during a traffic stop or what-have-you...
As Marge Simpson said...
You know, the courts may not be working any more, but as long as everyone is videotaping everyone else, justice will be done.
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Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:4, Interesting)
Staying invisible to the cops these days is getting more and more high tech.
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Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:4, Interesting)
i don't know about being monitored all the time (just because i'm in public doesn't mean i want people whom i can't see watching me over an internet video stream), but i think the wireless mesh network could definitely be expanded to non-city-vehicles.
perhaps with the integration of vehicle GPS systems such networks can provide real-time traffic reports/analysis to drivers. i'd be interested in seeing whether this kind of smart p2p "traffic network" could optimize traffic flow by directing drivers to the most efficient route with regards to traffic conditions.
if a freeway gets too backed up, it can slow down or cause traffic jams in other connected freeways. but if people can look up real-time traffic information then they might avoid congested routes, preventing severe traffic jams from forming. this would also help distribute traffic flow more evenly rather than having a few overcrowded routes and a bunch of underutilized routes.
this would also lower the cost of rolling out wireless access in a lot of areas.
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Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:4, Insightful)
I can see one good thing coming out of this (and a lot of not so good things), which is that there will be no more 'lost tapes'.
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Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Exactly.
Wonder what the job market is like in Ponca City because this is enough for me to move there. This is the best news I've ever heard to prevent police corruption and increase productivity. City leaders in Ponca City really know how to support their constituents.
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this is enough for me to move there
That is a RIDICULOUS statement. You want to move to PONCA CITY, OKLAHOMA for the SOLE reason that their police cars will be equipped with real-time video cameras? SERIOUSLY? Do you OFTEN have run-ins with the cops that end up with you being falsely convicted of crimes due to the lack of oversight? Are you fucking BLACK?
Oh no, that last sentence will get me a -1, Flamebait. But I am serious.
Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:5, Insightful)
Huh? Is my sarcasm meter blinking out? You are joking, right? Is someone going to review all this video? If it's not open to the public (who would watch it- distributed computing through voyeurism) who watches the video to make sure the cops really are doing their job,"increasing productivity", etc? I won't use a car analogy here since we're actually talking about something car related. But $1M isn't cost savings when you pay in taxes rather than in ISP fees, and hiring more and more levels of security to watch people is not real security, nor efficient. If society has really reached the point where everyone has to be watched and no one can be trusted, then is that society worth saving, or is it just another failed experiment to be tossed into history's dust bin?
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Many departments have been doing this for a decade (Score:3, Informative)
The reality is, most police are actually in favor of this once they realize how it helps them do their job and keeps them out of trouble.
I've actually seen a case made by one of these tapes. I've sat in a DA's conference room watching as a DUI investigation a defens
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
BTW, even for those departments that don't have video, many cops these days carry mobile audio recorders and they push "record" when they talk to suspects.
Yup. My brother does this.
If the guy in the back seat won't stop trash talking and generally being a loudmouth asshole, he simply puts the recorder on the dash, and presses record in a visible dramatic sort of way.
Instant silence, and politeness from the back seat.
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On the other side, there is a compelling and important reason to not record the activities of the general public. It would provide the government with a
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Re:Fine, Just Fine... (Score:4, Informative)
In the UK everyone has access to any footage anyone records of them on CCTV, whether the person recording is a private company, or the government. It's not exactly one-sided.
You missed a few bits out:
1. They're not obliged to reply to your request immediately - and they're not obliged to pause their normal operations between the day your letter demanding information arrives and the day it's replied to.
So if it takes 30 days for your letter to hit the top of the pile and tapes are recycled after 28 days, there's nothing to give you.
2. There are plenty of examples of all the CCTV cameras in an area being mysteriously "out of service" in areas where something politically sensitive is going on.
3. The law is very badly enforced. I know of no widely publicised case where an organisation has been punished for not properly honouring a request for information - yet I can't believe this hasn't happened yet. Hell, it's happened to me.
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Let the lawsuits begin ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Let the lawsuits begin ... (Score:5, Insightful)
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"They'll just have to offer upload and/or download speed that is faster than the free service and some people will be willing to pay the price for the higher speed... if the company actually delivers the speed they paid for..."
Or offer more services, such as email, good usenet access, etc.
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Not really. think about it. how many people just need wifi speeds for most of their browsing? this isn't to replace a slashdotters fiber connection, This is to give you wifi while getting sun in the park.
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Free wifi + real time video = bandwidth issues and (Score:4, Interesting)
Free wifi + real time video + VOIP = bandwidth issues and maybe even AP over load.
also mesh network may make things even slower and traffic may have to use a few links to get a hard wired network link.
What if you have 80% to 100% homes on a block useing this?
What if 4-5 cops cars are in the same area?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Qos addresses most of those issues, The problem IMO is that most wireless technologies are easy to jam. WPA for example is easy as hell to jam, a felon with a laptop with a laptop and aircrack can just kick all local users (including the cops) off the router. OTOH as long as this is in addition to their standard communication methods i don't see this as a problem.
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But as to jaming, you're being overly optimistic. Any WiFi can be jammed, regardless of the encryption used. All one needs is to put out enough RF noise in the WiFi band and it's toast. Some basic electronics knowledge is all it would take to build an RF jammer.
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But how will the cops have wifi in Residential areas?
Security thinking (Score:4, Interesting)
Ok, security-thinking time...
Hmmm. If this were done someplace that was worth the effort (no idea what that city is like) it could potentially be a great way to keep track of where the cops were and maybe even what they were up to.
--MarkusQ
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Compromising your local router would provide an easy way to give you those extra seconds to flush your stash, but then again having somebody looking out of the window probably has the same effect.
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Not very difficult. Keep an eye on the station and when you see a lot of patrol cars parked you know its near a shift change.
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I think the problem with this system is the same problem with the non-live video cameras installed in police cars. The police have complete control of the video. So they can just delete it if it shows something they don't want, but the suspect doesn't get to do that.
I remember seeing a news story recently of a police brutality case. As usual, the cop who did it had erased his own car's tape. Unfortunately, another cop was on the scene and failed to erase his car's video. So the offending cop got fired.
Re:Security thinking (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude, you can have a real-time police radar like in GTA4.
Each car is constantly transmitting ... a proximity detector should be rather easy to implement just based on signal strength alone.
Depending what frequency they're using, you can possibly use two antennas to triangulate a guess as to where the police car is relative to you.
The pain in the ass comes in when you start dealing with reflected signals in urban areas.
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hrmmm what's easier, cracking their encrypted signal to get some gps coordinates, or just detecting signal strength?
Cracking the encrypted signal would obviously be ideal, and more l33t, but seems like a pain in the ass when compared to triangulation.
Obviously neither is as easy as it sounds, unless the police all use the same encryption key, and some protocol that's easily cracked - like WEP.
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Don't worry, they'll change the WEP password at least once a month.
But seriously, how big a leap would that be compared to monitoring police radio? IMO not enough to outweigh the potential benefits.
Another question is will the recordings be public domain, or semi-public? For example I wanted a recording of a call I placed to the police switchboard (not 911) when an ex-landlord was trying to force his way into my apartment illegally. They charge $35 to search for the call, and another $80 to make a copy.
And by "free" (Score:4, Insightful)
They mean paid for by their own tax dollars.
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Yes, like the streets. Streets are paid for by tax money because even someone who never leaves the basement profits from them (pizza delivery). Don't you think data connectivity is also basic infrastructure that should just be available to everyone?
I live south of ponca city (Score:5, Informative)
I live south of Ponca City in Stillwater, OK. I can tell you that what ever mom and pop isp is in the area is probably gonna run the whole thing for them. There isn't a strong presence in the area by any large isps. It should also be noted that Ponca City is mostly Oil Refineries (Connaco / Philips ) and the area around there is sparsely populated. Were talking farmland and grazing grassland prairie. Most of the people around here do not have Internet access other than dial up. I pay a hefty fee to get 1 mb point to point 802.11 from a tower 3 miles away.
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I worked for Conoco / DuPont / CSC / QSR back when we did the Y2K.
You aren't kidding, there is NOTHING there.
Conoco has the fastest link, a microwave link, that goes all the way to corporate headquarters in Houston.
Funny thing, Conoco used to proxy EVERYTHING corporate-wide VIA A T1. I mean, where talking THOUSANDS of desktops using a single T for internet usage.
tnproxy.dupont.com (telnet, used for IRC lol)
webproxy.dupont.com
ftproxy.dupont.com
Of course, those are / where internal addies, so they don't work
Hacked in (Score:5, Funny)
TOS? (Score:2)
More Muni Wifi Hype (Score:2)
TFA describes video for traffic *stops*. Real-time video for traffic stops hardly seems to be a benefit beyond the recoded video we have seen for 20 years.
While driving, the Wifi client spends so much time and effort perform hand-off to the next of 500 access points, the packet loss is tremendous.
Most regions with Wifi mesh networks are turning them down or vastly scaling back expectations. Because Wifi was *never designed for active mobility*.
The sad part is when these Wifi abominations displace simp
If only Bill HIcks were alive (Score:2)
Goes back to poking sore tooth
OMFG (Score:2)
I lived in Ponca City for a short time.
Worked at the Conoco Refinery in IT, during the Y2K upgrade when it was owned by DuPont.
All I can say is: Where the and what the FUCK are they doing to get the money for this? Ponca is a city of (literally) a couple bars, a refinery (that was built around 3 seperate refineries), and that's about it.
Kicker, of speaker fame, is located about 45 minutes away, and they have a college nearby.
Baby Does (strip club / whorehouse) was about the biggest industry outside of the
Government-run communications (Score:2)
I'm sorry, but the idea of putting the government in charge of my communications channels is truly frightening. Once your government becomes your ISP, it becomes that much easier to sneak in all sorts of nasty acceptable use, content filtering, and traff
So this is how the Republic dies... (Score:2)
So our gilded cages with literal police microphones in the bushes now include free wi-fi? Can I get cappuccino with that? I mean who cares none of us were using our freedom, any ways? Right?
Dumbasses! A cage isn't better just because it's gilded...
"To be like âoea bird in a gilded cageâ is to live in luxury but without freedom.."
http://www.bartleby.com/59/4/gildedcage.html [bartleby.com]
Every time another cop camera goes up you make a founding father rotate at high velocity in their grave.
More Details about Ponca City's Wireless Mesh here (Score:2, Informative)
More details about the Ponca City's wireless mesh in the slideshow presentation here [flickr.com].
Not the first system (Score:3, Informative)
Motorola makes a product that streams video back from first responder vehicles over mesh networks that has been available for a couple years now. One of the customers is the LAPD.
http://www.motorola.com/business/US-EN/Mobile+Video+Sharing_US-EN.do?vgnextoid=c5dc23805ae46110VgnVCM1000008406b00aRCRD [motorola.com]
good, though I'm skeptical (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:good, though I'm skeptical (Score:5, Interesting)
"why would they want to turn off the camera?"
There are lots of good reasons. What do you do when you're called to a traffic accident on the freeway and your car is blocking traffic for six hours with the lights on? Multiply that by the three or four cars that respond and note that our system records both the forward view out the windshield and the in-car (facing backseat) camera, that's a lot of footage of nothing. Yes, "storage is cheap" but when you consider an indefinite retention period and a discoverable chain of custody, it's very expensive relative to the budget of the average department.
I like the system in the cars my department has. It starts recording when you hit RECORD or active the overheads. When it starts recording, it automatically saves the 60 seconds immediately prior to the activation event. When you turn the lights off or hit STOP, it will keep recording for 45 seconds and then really stop. Thus for each activation event you're going to get a minimum of 1:45 recorded, including a full minute before you hit the lights. This look back feature really helps to put recordings in their proper context.
While you certainly can stop recording at any time, it's going to look really bad if you've always recorded your stops to completion and then a nasty allegation is made against you at the same event where you hit STOP right in the middle of the contact.
Incidentally our systems are tape-free. Each car has a WiFi antenna and it will automatically upload any new files when the car drives into one of several zones in the city. For example, there's a WiFi zone at the service garage pumps and in the station lot. However, the cameras also pipe a feed to the MDT which is connected to the network through a Verizon Air Card. Even though it's not streaming video, dispatch does have the ability to pull up real-time video from any car. It works well for our purposes, and probably a lot cheaper than the solution this town is looking at.
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State of the art of local PDs can blow your mind.. (Score:3, Informative)
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use a VPN much?