Dee
07-14-2007, 11:27 AM
UK straps cameras to bobbies' helmets (http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070713/police_helmet_camera_070713/20070713?hub=World)
LONDON — Britain is taking its surveillance to a new level, strapping video cameras to the helmets of its famed bobbies -- a move the government says will cut down on paperwork and help prosecute criminals.
By providing dramatic footage of victims, suspects and witnesses, judges and jurors will be able to "see and hear the incident through the eyes and ears of the officer at the scene," Minister of State for Security Tony McNulty said.
The Home Office said it was allocating $6 million to fund the devices for Britain's 42 police forces -- enough to buy more than 2,000 cameras.
Police already use handheld cameras to monitor crowded events and the new head-mounted devices, worn around the ear or clipped on to a helmet, have been used on a trial basis by police in Plymouth, in southwestern England, since 2005. Similar cameras are used by security guards at sports venues to hunt for soccer hooligans.
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But Ben Ward, Human Rights Watch's associate Europe director, expressed concern.
"The privacy questions raised by the plan will turn on whether the safeguards, including on notification and storage, are uniformly respected," he said in a telephone interview in London.
The Home Office said the cameras, which have enough memory to hold 24 hours of video, were not intended to record continuously. Officers would turn the devices on and off at their discretion, speaking into the camera after turning it on to explain where, when and why they were starting it. A second explanation was required before turning the device off.
The report also cautioned against taking extraneous video when entering private homes, and said officers should turn cameras off during strip searches. But it also threatened disciplinary action against officers who deliberately masked the camera's view or deleted video from the camera's memory.
The Home Office said it was exploring other uses for the devices, including fitting them with the ability to send video live to a command center, or special license-plate recognition software which would enable police to identify stolen or suspicious vehicles just by looking at them.
LONDON — Britain is taking its surveillance to a new level, strapping video cameras to the helmets of its famed bobbies -- a move the government says will cut down on paperwork and help prosecute criminals.
By providing dramatic footage of victims, suspects and witnesses, judges and jurors will be able to "see and hear the incident through the eyes and ears of the officer at the scene," Minister of State for Security Tony McNulty said.
The Home Office said it was allocating $6 million to fund the devices for Britain's 42 police forces -- enough to buy more than 2,000 cameras.
Police already use handheld cameras to monitor crowded events and the new head-mounted devices, worn around the ear or clipped on to a helmet, have been used on a trial basis by police in Plymouth, in southwestern England, since 2005. Similar cameras are used by security guards at sports venues to hunt for soccer hooligans.
<snip>
But Ben Ward, Human Rights Watch's associate Europe director, expressed concern.
"The privacy questions raised by the plan will turn on whether the safeguards, including on notification and storage, are uniformly respected," he said in a telephone interview in London.
The Home Office said the cameras, which have enough memory to hold 24 hours of video, were not intended to record continuously. Officers would turn the devices on and off at their discretion, speaking into the camera after turning it on to explain where, when and why they were starting it. A second explanation was required before turning the device off.
The report also cautioned against taking extraneous video when entering private homes, and said officers should turn cameras off during strip searches. But it also threatened disciplinary action against officers who deliberately masked the camera's view or deleted video from the camera's memory.
The Home Office said it was exploring other uses for the devices, including fitting them with the ability to send video live to a command center, or special license-plate recognition software which would enable police to identify stolen or suspicious vehicles just by looking at them.