Image source www2.dijon.inra.fr/

China Daily had an interesting article about surveillance cameras in China's Guangdong province.

GUANGZHOU: A new province-wide intelligent video surveillance system comprising 1 million cameras is putting criminals in the frame in Guangdong province.

The system, which will be fully operational next year, will automatically alert police about fights, robberies and other major crimes and incidents, according to a police officer from Guangdong provincial department of public security on Friday.

The cameras are being installed on major highways, busy streets, railway stations, bus terminals, piers and other public places in the province.

Social security will be constantly monitored in major public places in the province where the crime rate is higher than many regions in the Chinese mainland.

"The new video surveillance system is expected to cast an inescapable net that will help reduce the crime rate in the prosperous province," said the police officer, who declined to be named.

Guangdong has already installed more than 900,000 video cameras in Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhongshan, Dongguan, Chaozhou, Zhuhai and other major cities in the Pearl River Delta, which borders Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions.

And, even though the system is not fully up to speed yet, it has helped police detain more than 10,000 suspects since the beginning of the year. More than 18,000 cases of street crime have been prevented or fought, the officer added.

The cameras will be part of an advanced video network that will link local police crime-reporting centers to every major public place in the region's cities.

Many locals have welcomed the cameras.

"The new intelligent video surveillance system will certainly help deter suspects from committing crimes in public places," said Chen Wensi, a white-collar worker in Guangzhou. "It should be good news for most of the Cantonese people."

Law and order had been a problem in the province, added Chen, who had two mobile phones stolen in two months earlier this year.

In another development, Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province, has equipped all of its public buses with surveillance cameras to deter pickpockets and robbers.

The cameras are fitted to the front, middle and rear of all the city's 8,000 public buses.

And there has been a notable reductin in the number of pickpocket, robbery and sexual harassment cases since the video surveillance system was brought into operation in the southern metropolis this year.

The officials in the article made a few claims:

• The system has helped detain 10,000 suspects
• 18,000 street crimes have been fought
• Pickpocketing, sexual harassment, and robberies are down on public buses

While the numbers quoted in this article appear high (10,000 detained,  18,000 fought), they are quite low in relation to the number of cameras installed – one million.  These statistics also do not include conviction rates which will certaintly be much lower.  Perhaps even as low as the UK, which is only able to convict one criminal for every 1,000 cameras installed.

The official in this article also claims there has been crime reduction success in public buses.  I agree and believe it's logical to assume there is potential for surveillance cameras to be effective in buses (and possibly taxis).  This may be due to the fact people are in closer quarters, are aware of the cameras, and there is also potential for the higher camera image quality due to the fixed distance factor.  However, this fact has yet to be proven by academics.

It would be nice to see a government report some statistics on the use of privately owned cameras.  When this happens, a comparison can be made between the two sectors in the two spaces (public cameras – public spaces / private cameras – private spaces).  I believe private cameras have the potential to be many times more effective than public cameras, but we will never know this until police modify their reporting standards to include effectiveness stats from the private sector.

Related: Police seek men after duo attacked on bus

Similar to a mini-helicopter, the device has four pairs of carbon-fibre rotor blades which support a camera. An operator on the ground controls the vehicle's flight using a hand-held control panel with two joysticks.

The drone – which is based on military Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technology – feeds live images back to a screen on the control unit, enabling the "pilot" to operate the machine even when it is out of his or her sight.

Merseyside Police was the first force to use the drones, launching them during a number of crackdowns on gun and gang crime, as well as against anti-social behaviour. The aerial cameras have also previously been deployed to deter crime at pop festivals. Yesterday was the first time it was used at a demonstration

"The drone, fitted with CCTV cameras, will be used by a trained operator from the manufacturing company. It will record any incidents of disorder for evidence-gathering purposes. The drone is similar to a small, model aircraft."

The drone is about three feet in diameter and can be configured to gather still images, video, thermal images and night-vision pictures. Unlike full-scale police helicopters it is virtually inaudible.

There seems to be a lot of these airborn cameras going up lately.  The US recently launched a powerful camera mounted to a hot air ballon near our northern border.  While this "border camera" did not get much press in the states, our neighbors to the north told us exactly how they felt about it – they pulled their pants down and  mooned it.

60 Minutes recently ran a story on unmanned drone camera planes in Iraq and the Army deemed them "highly effective".  In Lancaster PA, which proclaims itself the "most watched city in America" is also creating an eye in the sky program.  Lancaster will mount a surveillance camera to an airplane circling the community 24 hours a day in an effort to "combat crime".

Whether these cameras are effective, or just capturing some Canadian bacon remains to be seen.  I think it's obvious that aerial cameras deployed for a specific reason have the potential to be more effective than just for "general surveillance".

WKSL out of Salt Lake City Utah is shedding more insight into what happens when surveillance cameras are installed in high crime public parks.  According to the first article, four cameras were installed in Pioneer Park to battle the drug dealing problem.  The police were looking to achieve three objectives:

• Deter crime
• Document crime
• Allow officers to monitor the park

While these are realistic goals, the question now being asked is exactly which type of crime are they trying to deter?   A few other cities have claimed success reducing vandalism and grafitti in public parks, but mention nothing of drug deals.

The second article goes on to state:

The cameras went up last February, along with signs advertising that the area was under 24-hour surveillance. Since then, police say calls for assistance at the park have been cut in half.

In 2007, officers were called out 971 times. So far this year, they've been called just 498 times. Data from 2008 was excluded because of park construction.

"What we've really seen it drop in is drug dealing," Snyder said, adding that since February officers have only made a couple of drug arrests.

But police admit the dealing has been displaced, not stopped.

"It may push into other areas, but it has inconvenienced the drug dealers. If nothing else, they're losing some of their customers," Snyder said.

The displacement of dealers is not a secret to Ron Martensen, who owns "Mechanized", a shop near 200 South and 550 West. He has seen an increased police presence, but he's also seen a lot of problems.

"I think that's the whole thing with–the camera is a great indicator it's just going to move somewhere else," Martensen said. "We'd have people standing directly in front of our door. The door opened outward, so you couldn't open the door without hitting them."

I don't know if the Salt Lake City police can really categorize this as a success.  Yes, drug deals are down in the park but they have simply moved outside of the location of the cameras.  While the park is now "safer" for children, the streets are not.   I'm going to chalk this one up as another politician claiming success because the verdict is not quite out yet.

Could Google's Android be a good fit for the future of smart cameras?  Recently Android has made it's way out of the cell phone market and into the fast growing netbook market.  Is the next logical leap into smart IP video surveillance cameras?

Back in May, 2009, Vikram Agarwak wrote a program called Watchtower: A Surveillance Camera for Android.  This app is a simple program which turned his Android powered phone into a surveillance camera with remote access.  While this program is very rudimentary when compared to modern IP cameras, the Watchtower app serves as a good "proof of concept" that Android can be used for this other rapidly growing market: Smart IP surveillance cameras.

Comparison to the evolution of smart cable boxes
About a decade ago, the cable industry struggled dealing with new technologies like personal DVRs and Tivo systems.  The cable companies wanted to keep proprietary VOD in the cable headends, and leave "dumb" cable boxes out at the edge of the network.  Over time, the marketplace chose the winner, placing the "intelligent" cable boxes at the edge of the network.

Android looks like it can possibly do the same thing for the intelligent video business.  By building an infrastructure where a self-contained android-powered video camera can store video, perform video analytics, access control,  and alarm monitoring, the economies of scale go up, and the price for this techonology will come down.

Android architecture examined
The figure below shows how an Android powered camera could work in a small, medium, or large scale setting for both the public and private sectors.  Over time, the potential is there for local and federal government to connect into this architecture for both monitoring and sending crime metadata.

Click figure for larger view

I think Google's Android has the potential to do well in the smart IP camera market. The Android operating system itself would not take long at all to port over to this new hardware, and surveillance software would have to be tweaked and re-compiled to run on an android platform.

While it takes good CCTV practices, the correct installation context, and technology for surveillance cameras to be effective, using Android technology may prove to be a cost effective way to help offset the problems with practices and installation contexts.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6hgWK5CA4o

David Smiley from the Miami Herald has an interesting story of how a dashboard mounted camera with audio captured police allegedly framing a DWI suspect.

A video that once again has the Hollywood Police Department investigating allegations of corruption against its officers went undiscovered for months because a DVD filed March in court did not contain the incriminating clip.

The video, in which officers are heard discussing plans to doctor an arrest report in order to fault an accused drunk driver in a police-involved crash, is now at the center of an internal affairs investigation into the actions of five department employees.

According to court documents, prosecutor Cathy Berkowitz received the clip from Torrensvilas attorney Lawrence Meltzer. Prosecutors dropped all charges against the 23-year-old Hollywood resident Wednesday, despite evidence that she had a blood-alcohol level twice the legal limit at the time of her arrest.

FAR-REACHING

Now, with the video in-hand, Finkelstein said the allegations against the officers could act as legal dominoes in pending and resolved cases in which they were called as witnesses.

"This could have huge, far-reaching implications and that's why you need to understand this is more important than a couple of cops did something bad," he told The Miami Herald.

The state attorney's office is now evaluating 27 pending cases involving the accused officers to determine whether it can prosecute without the officers' testimony, according to Morton.

Those cases range from misdemeanor DUI to murder, said chief assistant public defender Mindy Solomon.

She said the Public Defender's Office is also reviewing cases closed during the last 30 days and during the last two years to see if they could be potentially reopened.

"We have new evidence we didn't have before," she said.

When will these city workers stop self-indicting themselves?   Here's the rundown:

1. Taxpayer pays for pricey monitoring system and salaries of police officers
2. Cameras catch officers allegedly doing something wrong
3. Officers are put on desk duty, may lose their jobs, maybe goes to jail
4. Taxpayer pays for impending settlement
5. 27 cases will have to be revisited

Correction applied 7/31/09

The New York City Metropolitan Transporatation Authority (MTA) is experimenting with surveillancec cameras inside the cars.  Their goal is to put surveillance cameras on one train in a few lines by years end.

According to Tom Namako from The NY Post

Every corner of every car will be in the cameras' view.

The train, which will run on a "letter" line chosen at a later date, will be outfitted with a digital surveillance system that creates a computer-based log of events that can be viewed after a crime or emergency. No one will be watching the images live, but the cameras, authorities believe, will at least make would-be criminals think twice.

"Subways should be equipped with camera capability so we'll be able to determine if a crime has been committed," said MTA board member Norman Seabrook.

The cameras will be a crucial weapon against terror, he said.

"It will also help us get better information on how to deal with a situation should something occur in the post-9/11 world," added Seabrook, who chairs the MTA board's Safety and Security Committee.

"This is not an inexpensive endeavor."

Some MTA buses — mostly in Manhattan — have cameras. And earlier this year, Brooklyn's B46 line, one of the highest-crime routes in the city, received some buses with cameras.

I think this is a great endeavor for the MTA to undertake.  While the MTA has not published the type and amounts of crime that happen in the subway system, certainly a system like this can be used for identification, apprehensions and conviction purposes.

I don't quite agree with Norman Seabrook's comments statinng that these unmanned cameras will be "crucial weapon against terror".  The London underground has had CCTV cameras for years and the goal of that system is to minimize petty crime.  British officials have also looked into using smart CCTV as an anti-terror tool, but there has been no report as to how it works and where it can be effective.

Norman is not the only politician selling these cameras to the public as a way to fight terrorism.  It seems like many politicians will make this claim in order to justify these pricey toys.  Norman should really be making rational statements like how the cameras can be used to assist investigations just like they were instrumental in the London bombings.

Recently, some MTA crime has surfaced and have been captured by what I call "vigilante cameramen".  One of these rogue-commuter-turned-crimefighter caught a  scratchiti "artist" and submitted the pictures to the NYPD crime stoppers.  The artist was identified, apprehended, and soon convicted, although the whole process could have been quite confrontational if the artist saw the cameraman snapping a photo of him.  Citizens should now leave that potentially confrontational situation to the unmanned human-less cameras!

A $23 million proposal to place more than 3,000 cameras around public-housing developments has alarmed privacy advocates and raised questions over the effectiveness of surveillance systems.

Under the plan, the Chicago Housing Authority would install the cameras near 16,000 apartments in the city, about three quarters of the authority's properties, and it would update surveillance systems installed earlier at public housing for seniors. Officials say the program would improve safety and security around residents' homes.

Already, more than 2,000 cameras in the city link to an emergency command center, making Chicago's residents some of the most closely watched in the world. Mayor Richard M. Daley has said that if Chicago wins the 2016 Olympic bid, he would like a camera on every street corner of the city.

"There isn't really any sort of public dialogue, ever, about how much is enough or what's effective," says Ed Yohnka, spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois. "There's no real, definitive evidence that any of this is effective. There are just pronouncements that it is."

Yohnka and other civil-liberties advocates have acknowledged that people should not expect privacy in public places, but he questioned the extent of formal talks between officials and residents, and called the number of cameras in the authority's plan "extraordinary."

It is not yet clear how 3,198 new cameras at the authority would operate, or where officials would place them. Officials selected Siemens Building Technologies Inc. as the proposed contractor after a competitive bid process in April.

Chicago has a lot of public surveillance equipment.  They have street surveillance cameras, gunshot detection systems, and red light cameras.  They also have a manned command center where officers are staffed 24/7 . Richard M Daley, Mayor of Chicago went so far as to claim:

This new equipment has proven to be a strong deterrent.  Through a combination of good police work, new technology like Operation Disruption, and community involvement, we can continue to make our children and neighborhoods safer.

The crime chart at City Data paints a bit of a different picture. Since 2004, murders, robberies & burglaries have remained steady while the other categories were in slight decline. The overall crime in Chicago has been in decline for ten years and this pre-existing trend needs to be accounted for before claims are made that the surveillance system is effective.  It's also hard to measure any crime reduction effectiveness campaign when there are multiple initiatives being undertaken at the same time like "Operation Disruption" and "community involvement".

While I agree CCTV systems for public housing are a good idea because public housing sometimes has higher-than-average crime rates.  However, it's my belief that these systems will merely displace the crime to areas outside of the reach of the cameras.  The Chicago Housing Authority should put a framework in place to measure any displacement or diffusion of benefits phenomenon so they can report back to the citizens just how effective the system really is.  The citizens of Chicago don't need another politician claiming success without backing up the claim with evidence.  The Mayor should work with local universities who can assist building a framework for an effectiveness study.

The New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) made the following claim in late 2006:

"NYCHA has experienced historic reductions in crime which is consistent with crime reductions across the City," said Vice Chairman Andrews. "Under the CCTV surveillance program since 2002, crime has been reduced by an additional 9.5% in NYCHA developments. The addition of CCTV systems at NYCHA's will continue to reinforce the downward trend in crime. At Gowanus Houses the number of crime incidents between 2002 and 2005 decreased by 28% and here at Wyckoff Gardens by 46%."

While I'm not disagreeing the potential is there to reduce crime in public housing, these claims can only be considered claims.  Spending $23 million in tax dollars in an attempt to "reduce crime" (or to win an Olympic bid?!) without engaging crime academics is simply a bad idea.

Security cameras are set to be installed at two Chicopee Housing Authority (CHA) complexes as officials move to ensure tenants' safety and to monitor any suspicious activity.

11 cameras will be installed at the Cabot Manor Apartments, which consists of 26 buildings on Stonina Drive and Plante Circle, and five cameras will be installed at Canterbury Arms Apartments, 165 East Main St. – both federally aided projects.

"The company is now ordering their supplies and we believe they will be installing them by the end of July and it will take two to three weeks," she said. "I believe this will have a positive effect for the housing authority and will provide much-needed security and address any issues we have. The cameras will be day-night cameras and will give us wonderful pictures" for the authority and police if needed.

"This will give us additional coverage and security issues will be addressed. We want to make sure the developments remain safe for all tenants who live there," she said.

Blazic is hopeful other authority complexes will have security cameras installed in the future.

Meanwhile, Mayor Michael D. Bissonnette said 15 interior and exterior security cameras, along with a variety of security monitoring and alarm upgrades installed last year at the main library, have already proven their worth in minimizing vandalism and damage after hours.

The mayor said the city is continuing to work on installing camera surveillance at three downtown intersections, working through the city's Information Technology Department and Chicopee Electric Light.

"We are planning to install the cameras in the downtown triangle to cover the major intersections," Bissonnette said.

In preparation for the downtown camera installation, the municipal utility has placed high-pressure sodium lamps on 25-foot poles.

It is well known that some public housing units suffer from higher than normal crime rates.  Many housing authorities have claimed that the installing of surveillance cameras have assisted in decreasing crime, however, it's my opinion that these cameras merely displace crime to other locations.  I do believe cameras in the public housing context are a good idea, and they certainly can be used for investigation purposes as well as apprehensions and conviction of criminals.

If a public housing inhabitants are a certain percentage (i.e. 5-10%) of the total police department precinct's population, and the cameras are all installed and "go-live" around the same time, the CHA can eassily perform an effectiveness study.  The area outside of the public housing becomes the control area, and the public housing units become the experimental area.

The mayor also states that the city is installing street lighting for the cameras in the downtown area.  Mayor Bissonnette should be aware that while street lighting is important to capture better photographic images from the cameras, improving the city's street lighting can be even more effective than installing surveillance cameras. It is important to understand this, so no extra credence is given solely to the cameras if in fact the crime rates go down in the city's downtown area.

Mayor Bissonnette should modify his police department's records management systems to report back to his citizens just how effective each surveillance campaign has been.

1. Install a pricey surveillance system
2. Capture city employee doing something wrong
3. Tax payers foot massive settlement fee

According to WXYZ:
The incident happened at Pontiac Central High School. The teen, Davion Hudson, is standing in the hallway before the start of class in the morning. His world history teacher, Bradley Thompson, walks by, and words are exchanged. The teacher then pushes Davion and then leaves. Davion called his mother and told her of the incident.

A few minutes later, the teacher comes up behind Davion and this time he grabs both of Davion's arms behind his back. Then the teacher put Davion into a choke hold and slammed him into metal doors.

When will these city employees learn to stop self-indicting themselves?

An Atherton public works supervisor on trial for allegedly grabbing a female officer inside the town police station testified Tuesday that she took him to a break room and inexplicably pushed him away twice in front of a surveillance camera.

In a bizarre twist, Ortiz-Buckley's ex-husband, John Buckley, testified Tuesday that his former wife was consistently "dishonest" and had perjured herself in court on several points the day before.

A day later, the public works supervisor was acquitted:

After the trial adjourned, foreman Mario Holland, of San Mateo, said he and the 11 other jurors agreed quickly that Lee hadn't proven beyond a reasonable doubt that a battery took place. They later reviewed the video footage and decided it wasn't clear there had been an assault either, given Henderson's large size and the tightness of the space.