Journalist, editor, analyst and trainer on computing, government, climate and data
Data from two councils, a rural district and a London borough, suggests big differences in spending on CCTV
Using Freedom of Information to find council CCTV costs, usage and efficiency in two contrasting areas of England. More recently, I have mapped comprehensive data collected by Big Brother Watch on this subject.
The debate over the use of CCTV can be rather sterile. The police, local authorities and other parts of the public sector present them as a public good, there “for your safety and security” as station announcements phrase it. Continue reading “A tale of two cameras”
Police forces are making extensive use of their numberplate cameras, but proving coy about their locations
This was one of a series of articles I wrote on police ANPR. It eventually led to a Guardian page lead story in August 2012 – based on the information gleaned from the eventual failure of a Freedom of Information request to Devon and Cornwall Constabulary, which revealed a “patchy” national system – and an article for MATTER published in August 2013 which I co-edited.
The cameras mentioned on the M5 were still in place at the end of August 2013. Following the loss of the FoI case there is, of course, no way of being sure if they are run by Devon and Cornwall Constabulary (whose area they are in). Continue reading “The ANPR secret”
One of the largest non-metropolitan police forces has released financial information on its use of roadside surveillance cameras
More on police use of ANPR cameras across England and Wales here and here. More on Oxfordshire county council’s ANPR system here.
Continue reading “Thames Valley Police unveils ANPR spend”
Devon and Cornwall Police has published the location of some of its road surveillance cameras on its website, despite these normally being secret
This was the first article in a long series on police ANPR, based on the Freedom of Information request mentioned here. It eventually led to a Guardian page lead story in August 2012 – based on the information gleaned from the eventual failure of the FoI request, which revealed a “patchy” national system – and an article for MATTER published in August 2013 which I co-edited.
Continue reading “Devon force divulges ANPR towns online”
A council using automatic numberplate recognition to manage traffic has released the locations of the cameras, having previously refused to do so
Oxfordshire county council initially refused to provide the locations of its then-new ANPR traffic camera sites, but did so when I requested the data under Freedom of Information – to its credit, only nine days after I asked. Police forces have taken a somewhat less co-operative view on this subject. Continue reading “Oxfordshire reveals ANPR traffic camera sites”