Police have more than 10,000 ANPR cameras
Police have confirmed that forces in England and Wales are passing up to 14m reads per day from automatic numberplate recognition cameras to a national database. All but two of England and Wales' police forces are passing data to the National ANPR Data Centre, run by the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) on behalf of …
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WTF?
Sorry, when did the UK get taken over by the East German government circa 1973?
FFS
You know what? I'm just sick of all this fannying about.
Lets just get it over and done with and get every man woman and child in the UK surgically implanted with tracking devices and all vehicles fitted with similar tech by law.
Anyone who doesn't agree should be assumed to be a terrorist and locked up. Anyone visting the UK must have one fitted or not be allowed in.
It is the inevitable destination of our surveilance spiral and at least this way we can save ourselves the expense of them incrementally building up to it.
Wow
Well it was recently revealed that the Dutch police were keeping similar pictures from a handful of cameras for three months and there were (rightly) complaints that this was against the privacy laws.
However the Dutch governments next move is to aim to fit all cars with GPS by 2012 so they can monitor road usage. They have not quite gone as far as forcing you to wear a tracking device yet.
You've just gotten FAIL all over your face
You honestly think the MPs and their families will be "plugged", or that HRH will be, either?
Great frakkin' mentality; just take it somewhere else, k?
Re: FFS
"It is the inevitable destination of our surveilance spiral and at least this way we can save ourselves the expense of them incrementally building up to it"
That attitude is exactly what the powers-that-be want in their population. I'd rather the government waste some tax money on a failed scheme than roll over like a dog and accept a loss of liberty.
Freedom comes at a price. Luckily for you it's not your life at stake, just a few tax dollars. WW2 veterans must be rolling in their graves at how soft and pathetic the populace has become.
That wasn't
the comment of someone resigned to the notion, but of someone raising awareness of it by mentioning it, probably using irony ('probably' because I don't have time to spend working out if it really, really is irony).
er
"Any prolonged retention would need to be clearly justified based on continuing value, not on the mere chance it may come in useful."
Isn't that the reason for not deleting innocent people's DNA from the DNA database? The mere chance that it may come in useful?
Pictures speak a thousand words
Has anyone here seen an ANPR camera picture?
Do we all know that the ANPR cameras take a photo of the whole of the front of the car? i.e. they include the face of the driver as well as the number-plate.
The number-plate recognition software limits surveillance at present, but it won't be long before they can do facial recognition and see who was driving vehicle as it passed the camera (and who was the passenger).
Are they talking about 'prolonged retention' of the raw digital photos or the output of the number-plate recognition software? (i.e. number-plate and date-time).
My bet is they are keeping the photos whilst waiting for more powerful software solution, then they'll be able to say "It was Winston Smith driving B19 BRO down the M4".
I have seen a picture ...
In fact, I've seen many, and your statement is incorrect. Whilst some cameras can take a picture of the whole of the front of the car, the majority of ANPR cameras are forward-facing and take an image of the rear plate.
Think its been done
all ready, wasn't there a system telling motorists to slow down in roadworks, done by number plate recognition, then DVLA look up and subsequent display.
Can APNR clock foreign number plates?
Standing corrected then
I've only seen the whole front of car ones; thanks for the clarification.
Does this vary by force then?
Usage
Varies by the type of camera reporting the plate and the source of the data. Some cameras (eg those use for calculating journey times) are only capable of sending textual data anyway, so doesn't matter which way it is pointing.
Actual usage varies from force to force, and from council to council.
Foreign plates
Yes, foreign plates can be seen, although ability to do so depends on the software in the camera. It already has to support 7 styles of UK plates, so think how many variations would be needed to support the EU.
Having said that, most are configurable as to which countries will be identified. Around ferry ports, for example, they're likely to support more countries than those in rural areas which will probably only look for the most common - GB, NI, IRL & FR.
It may also depends on what the plates are being used for that determines how the cameras are configured.
busy cop camers then!!
14 million a day, by my reckoning they should have every car in the country covered in a couple of days, plenty of time for a vat of coffee and a stack of doughnuts then the rest of the year off. cushy job whomsoever got that one me thinks
All those cameras and...
They still haven't managed to catch sight of my motorbike which was stolen the other week. :(
They're not for preventing, or sovlving, crime, silly.
The cameras are just there to provide more data so more computers need to be bought, so that whichever company it is that is paying kickbacks to those in power can make more profit.
The police don't work for us any more than the government do -- they work for whoever slips them the biggest wad of cash.
Or my rally car ...
... come on, what use are they if they can't find a stage prepared rally car (i.e. tends to stand out from the crowd)?
How many...
do the likes of TESCO have monitoring their parking policy?
They assure me that the data is thrown away immediately if you leave the carpark within the time limit, but what assurance do we have that the gov. won't apply a little pressure to allowing mining of said data?
blah
Unlike phone tapping which requires authorisation from the Home Secretary, MI5 / special branch / CTU can access such 'private sector' surveilance sources pretty much at whim...
Do they work on those silly numberplates?
The ones with script writing? I've seen one driving around for years. Probably swaps it out at MOT time. Dam thing is as hard to read as a capcha box.
Yup.
No problem. People who think that just changing the font on their car plate will stop them being tracked are barking up the wrong tree.
What we really need are LCD panels that fit ove rthe plate and change the number at random intervals. If/When you get pulled over by the plod, change it back, and watch their confused little faces.
@ Paul 4
"Nope → # ↑
Which is why they are band."
But doesn't stop them driving about with the things
Critical Mass
I like the critical mass thing, that when a volume of data reaches a certain point then the security of said data needs to higher.
Nobody's ever been able to tell me what that quantity is or how to measure it though :-(
Another money spinner?
So presumably the next step will be to allow suitably registered agencies or persons (Private Investigators, lawyers, CSA) to access the database, for a small fee of course and ascertain the movement of individuals to assist with inquiries?
So if you're planning an affair, take the bus!
All the buses I've seen in the last however many years
Have CCTV. Presumably exactly the same conditions apply.
Garage forecourts?
Does this include data from garage forecourts cameras? As this would slew the results significantly.
ACPO = private limited company
Can someone please explain to me why a PRIVATE LIMITED COMPANY is taking over police tasks?
According to their own web site the ACPO is:
"The Association has the status of a private company limited by guarantee. As such, it conforms to the requirements of company law and its affairs are governed by a Board of Directors."
http://www.acpo.police.uk/about.html
Reminds me of the out-of-control private police forces in third world dictatorships...
And the point is ......
Nothing in the article about how this information is being used (yes, yes, to prevent crime, but HOW).
If we believe the figures on uninsured or no MOT (10%), then that's more than a million hits a day. Are the Police actually following up on the registered keeper ?
Sir
Why won't they tell people how many camera's, who has them and where they are deployed?
What have they got to hide then?
Be curious to know how many false plates there are out there and how many more there will be once the great unwahed get wind of this mass population control^H^H^H^H^H^H tracking device.
Bastards.
Brilliant if your car is cloned.
Now you can get done for speeding, stealing petrol and hopping red lights without even leaving your house.
Actually ...
With this many cameras about, it should be a trivial matter for the system to determine that multiple hits on a particular registration have occurred close enough in time, and far enough apart in distance that it cannot be the same vehicle so some cloning has occurred. Flag up the registration as suspect and they get stopped. If you are the rightful owner you suffer the inconvenience of a stop, but find out that a clone exists, if not you're nicked.
In this particular instance (only), I reckon it is actually useful to have lots of cameras.
Yes
and it is down to you to prove you are innocent, not the other way round. WTF!
Brilliant if your car is cloned - Personalisation
This is why it is a good idea to personalise the area of your car in the area of front and rear number plates. Obscure bumper stickers should be enough - maybe stickers from countries which the great unwashed are unlikely to visit.
Barnsley
These cameras have been slowly popping up on all of the main roads into and out of Barnsley over the past months. Barnsley FFS. Scary if this is also happenning in other towns and cities to the same degree. However, once you know where they are they can be avoided in most cases, and in one case by driving past the local plod HQ.
Barnsley
I live in Barnsley on a major road into town that joins Sheffield Road and the damn things are dotted along there on various lamp posts and all approaches to various roundabouts including along Wakefield Road near Staincross (eastfield arms).
Here is the kicker, I don't drive (not banned just never learned) and quite frankly I think it is
another overbearing invasion of privacy like other monitoring devices but people won't listen !
Barnsley
They are just planning ahead.
One day we will run out of Russian gas
Then we will have to go back to coal
Eventually there will be a strike
The police will want to be able to stop pickets
This time they can do it without having to stand around on the M1 in the cold.
In other news...
...UK supermarkets have more than 10,000 trollies.
... insert massive overeaction big-brother anecdote here ...
Yes, how terrible of the Police - definately smacks of Big Brother, being able to track your clandestine trips to... erm... the shops, your Auntie Edna, your Moms, down the M3 to the South Coast.
Just think, they could profile you via your movements (although not of the bowel variety yet) - how terrible is that? Couple that with all the data the supermarkets are collecting and soon they'll be able to tell just how deviant you are!
What type of condoms did Mr.Tuttle buy from Tesco before driving 60 miles to visit a hooker with a bad cheese habit?
... snip ...
The knee-jerk reaction from netizens about anything to do with surveillance is so predictable, it's no longer funny - actually, it is, but also a bit sad.
Common sense and logic get flung out the window in favour of fictional scenarios, usually based around Orwells 1984 - the government is always watching!
BOLLOCKS
A Big Brother style state is impossible unless our current democracy completely breaks down - no change in government, no elections etc.
This nightmare scenario requires ruthless centralised power - a dictatorship.
It also requires competence - something our governments are usually massively short of.
And we'd need a massive 'sense of humour' failure, not something I can see happening in a hurry.
So pack your tin-foil hats away and catch a bloody wake up already.
Yes, we all know you'd love to wake up one morning as Neo, realising it's all just a construct and we're slaves - and then sock it to the machine! (... and give Trinity one for the lads)
The reality is, you'll wake up one morning and get a traffic fine through the post, then go to work and have a sandwich at lunchtime and plan the pissup on the weekend, where you'll discuss just how shit this country is and how nice it would be to move to somewhere sunny, whilst being filmed by CCTV cameras...
Democracy *has* broken down ...
There is no discernable difference between the choices offered to the electorate.
Legitimate concerns of the population are ignored.
The police are allowed to act in defiance of the law.
The number of bodies allowed to "investigate crimes" goes through the roof.
The burden of proof is effectively reversed.
The list goes on, but the point is that we're deluding ourselves if we don't think we are close to living in the equivalent of the Czech Republic in the 1960s.
In vehicle cameras used by all Police
I presume everyone here knows that all Police patrol cars (the Volvos with multiple antennaes) run these camera recognition systems. I have been stopped and taken into a patrol car for a false accusation on my vehicle twice. While I was inside I saw the monitor fitted between the dash that was constantly running and processing number plates. When I was running my car around on M.O.T expiry to a testing centre I avoided getting to close to a patrol car or turned off the road. Its these that do most of the spotting/work.
Selective stopping
Why aren't they constantly busting the 20% of young drivers with no insurance and identifying the 6.5% of all drivers representing 2-million uninsured cars on the road?
They must see them go past all day long, but choose not to stop them all ... but they obviously liked the look of you.
Really?
"The number of police cameras is significantly more than the 6,600 ANPR units run by the Highways Agency and Trafficmaster. These do not transmit full numberplates, as they are used to calculate the speed of traffic over sections of road."
Er, I don't think so, IIRC they used the information from Traffic Master to successfully support a murder case against a contract killer who'd driven up from London to Glasgow, killed the target, then drove back, it was after that the HA and Police started to really into ANPR.
ITS ALL A LIE !!!
they have capacity for well over what they need to allow for growth, without another 4.2 million been spent on some mp's cousing third uncle's fledgling cctv business.
i dont believe it for a min....
though on a sensible note
i am not happy to have my vehicle location tracked constantly but at the same time i dont really care all that much.
just wish they would use it for good e.g. tracking stolen vehicles etc ....
And another thing
Again what power does the ACPO have to make policy for this?
And why isn't there a law that says that retention must be restricted to the minimum necessairy for the stated purpose, and no more? If the police can't manage that, they can't be trusted to manage retaining anything at all. In which case the database is more of a danger than a benefit and therefore they mustn't be allowed to retain anything whatsoever.
Why keep the data so long
They know who the people of "interest" are to them and the vehicles they drive gained from other intelligence, so keeping the data relevant o their travels is somewhat justifiable, but why keep the data every time one of us nip to Tescos?
And who needs them to disclose the ANPR site, they are easy spotted with the exception of the CCTV converted ones which are a bit harder.
@Another money spinner
I should certainly hope not, that would be unacceptable
@Silly number plates
I believe these get flagged for a "human" to check
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