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CCTV really can be the third forensic science
Nick Smith, director of business development and operations, Scyron writes exclusively for the BAPCO Journal on the emotive issue of CCTV, underlining the importance of the technology, and the improvements taking place to make further use of this powerful technology.
A leaked report from the Metropolitan Police has reignited debate on the effectiveness of CCTV as an evidential tool in the fight against street crime. According to the report, only one crime is solved for every 1,000 CCTV cameras in London. The knee-jerk reaction is to brand CCTV as a waste of tax payers’ money and confine it to the technology scrap heap. However, that was not what the report was saying.
Any civil libertarian will tell you that CCTV is an emotive issue. Therefore, it’s vital we pause for breath and examine the real issues. Let’s avoid throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
Firstly, studies have revealed what most police officers will tell you, namely that there is a correlation between CCTV and reduced crime rates. This deterrent factor should not be underestimated. After using CCTV for 12 years, Dover Council found that burglaries in the areas covered by cameras halved and that car crime dropped by 87 per cent.
The other side of the coin from deterrence is securing convictions. This is where CCTV’s effectiveness is questioned most. For CCTV to become, as DCI Mike Neville from the Metropolitan Police suggested, the ‘third forensic science,’ we need to change the way video evidence is collected, processed and presented in court. The clarion call is that the quality of images is too low and simply, there is too much footage through which to sift.
It is true that the sheer volume of footage generated – much of it of dubious quality – makes analysis of CCTV evidence a retrospective activity. However, it does not have to be like this. It is possible to apply ‘intelligence’ to many cameras and provide law enforcement officers with high-quality evidence to bring offenders to justice. For example, several UK police services have enabled their cameras to look for ‘specific incidents:’ such as recording violent behaviour outside a nightclub, while ignoring passers by. Also, new technology is under development to extend this capability even further. For instance, UK researchers are working on systems that analyse video and audio information – such as shouting, abusive language, physical gestures and other threatening behaviour. Rules can be applied to cameras so that they would only relay information they judge to be the most suspicious as alerts to the control room. With intelligent CCTV, Big Brother really need not be watching you.
The move from analogue to digital cameras has helped improve image quality. However, a problem exists with the 6,000 different CCTV formats that have made the conversion, management and analysis of video footage so complicated that it often requires an expert. There needs to be greater standardisation and regulation.
Finally, dedicated investigation units armed with the latest technologies for processing, analysing and presenting video evidence are making a big difference. Already, the Metropolitan Police’s Operation Javelin is experimenting in this area. This pilot across 11 London boroughs uses dedicated visual image identification and detection offices (VIIDO). They collect and label images before forwarding them to a central circulation unit for distribution to officers and the media. With 1,000 identifications from 5,260 images processed so far, CCTV is proving itself to be a highly valuable police tool.
CCTV has a powerful role to play. For it to become the third forensic science we just have to think and operate differently.
