Taser, known for its stun guns used by law enforcement around the world, is banking its future on recording and documenting what police do in the field, with body cameras and a digital evidence storage service.
Ali Winston
Ali Winston is a freelance reporter, covering surveillance, privacy and criminal justice. His writing has won awards from the National Association of Black Journalists, the New York City Community Media Alliance, the City University of New York's John Jay College of Criminal Justice, the Association of Alternative Newsmedia, the San Francisco Peninsula Press Club and the Northern California chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. Originally from New York, he is a graduate of the University of Chicago and the University of California, Berkeley.
Posted inCriminal Justice, Immigration, Law Enforcement, Local Law Enforcement, Surveillance and Privacy
Arizona bill would fund predictive policing technology
Senate Bill 1293 would authorize spending $2 million on three one-year pilot projects of predictive policing software in urban and rural areas to generate predictions for various types of crime.
Posted inBorder Patrol, National Security, Surveillance and Privacy
Scathing audit on border agency drones comes as police interest rises
The inspector general concluded that there was no evidence that the agency’s 10 unarmed Predator B drones had improved border security or aided in apprehensions or drug interdictions.
Posted inSurveillance and Privacy
LA County to collect more personal data without public notice
L.A. County law enforcement officials are expanding a biometrics system to gather iris scans, palm prints and other information in the field and in jails. But they’re not telling the public.
Posted inMilitarization of Police
US police get antiterror training in Israel on privately funded trips
Law enforcement seminars, which began after the Sept. 11 attacks, include tactics to control crowds during protests and riots. For some, the training highlights how the friendly cop on the beat has been replaced by military-style troops.
Posted inLocal Law Enforcement, Surveillance and Privacy
Plans to expand scope of license-plate readers alarm privacy advocates
The use of license-plate readers has emerged as a big concern among privacy advocates, as one leading maker of the devices wants to fuse the technology with other sources of identifying information.
Posted inCriminal Justice, Immigration, Law Enforcement, Local Law Enforcement, Surveillance and Privacy
Facial recognition, once a battlefield tool, lands in San Diego County
A little-known pilot program is putting facial recognition technology in the hands of law enforcement. For some, it represents a radical milestone in militarization on U.S. soil.
Posted inLocal Law Enforcement, Surveillance and Privacy
Oakland surveillance center progresses amid debate on privacy, data collection
Local officials are pushing forward with a federally funded project to link surveillance cameras, license-plate readers, gunshot detectors, Twitter feeds, alarm notifications and other data into a unified “situational awareness” tool for law enforcement.
Posted inLocal Law Enforcement, Surveillance and Privacy
License-plate readers let police collect millions of records on drivers
At a rapid pace, and mostly hidden from the public, police agencies throughout California have been collecting millions of records on drivers and feeding them to intelligence fusion centers operated by local, state and federal law enforcement.