7 May 2008
Are CCTV cameras in UK a “fiasco”?
Filed under: Surveillance and Video — Kristen Yates
They are, according to one of London’s top police officers. In an interview with The Guardian, Mick Neville, head of New Scotland Yard’s Visual Images, Identifications and Detections Office, says that even though Britain has more security cameras than any other country in Europe, CCTV cameras have, so far, helped solve just three per cent of street robberies in London.
Don’t expect the cameras to disappear, however. According to The Register, the comments “appear to be a thinly veiled plea for more cash to be poured into the country’s favourite surveillance technology”.
2 Responses
6:26 pm
As someone who has spent almost a lifetime working in the U.K.’s CCTV Industry, I personally don’t see the comments “as a thinly veiled plea for more cash …”.
On the contrary, I believe that DCI Neville should be applauded for his comments, not because they have unwittingly stirred up a controversy here in the U.K., but simply because they are factually correct.
Public Space CCTV has historically developed along the lines of “lottery surveillance” using ‘Active’ systems, which are inherently highly inefficient in providing vital evidential recordings to support criminal investigations.
The greater need for ‘Passive’ use of video surveillance technology, has politically been deliberately overlooked, to the extent that modern Town Centre CCTV schemes, are seriously (and it could be argued fatally) constrained by the way in which they have been designed and deployed.
Is this a sudden revelation; well to be brutally honest … absolutely not!!
The shortcomings in current CCTV deployment have been well understood here for almost twenty years, but unfortunately it is not politically expedient to admit that successive UK governments have thrown vast sums of money into promoting the nationwide adoption of a hugely powerful technology, which has thus far been applied with almost total naivety and a common lack of understanding for the fundamental operational objectives.
Significant improvements in operational efficiency could easily be made, if more limited funding were made available to target affordable improvements, rather than wasting scarcely available resources on yet more questionable media attractive techniques such as “Talking CCTV”, or funding still further research that produces conclusions that were well understood by some, well over a decade ago.
Until there is a wider understanding of how CCTV should be appropriately deployed, no significant improvements will be made in operational efficiency, without accepting a very costly reliance on emerging computer based technologies.
Balancing operational requirements with privacy concerns, shouldn’t be a difficult exercise to undertake, and yet historically, there has been little clarity of thought, either in the way these systems are deployed, or indeed their implications for an individuals civil liberties.
Is this situation likely to change anytime soon?; well apparently not. The tragedy is that the UK is held to be the CCTV capital of the world, and many countries are enthusiastically embracing many of our worst practices, in a desperate attempt to play catch up.
It’s perhaps a sad reflection on our society, when speaking the truth no matter how unpalatable, is derided with greater contempt than would be considered appropriate, for those ultimately responsible for presiding over almost two decades of commissioning hugely expensive and often grossly inefficient video surveillance systems.
Jon
12:09 am
It’s nice to see someone stand up for actually UPGRADING CCTV coverage. No it’s not perfect, and yes, some individuals have concerns for their “personal civil liberties”. Frankly, that’s their problem! I agree that better systems, which were actually designed by those who need to use them, and funded up to allow utilisation of the best practice technology is the way forward for the future.
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