Subject: [NEXTEL-1] [justnetnews] August 7, 2003 - NLECTC News Summary]

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 2003 13:40:10 -0400

NLECTC Law Enforcement & Corrections Technology News Summary
Thursday, August 7, 2003
                    
***************************HEADLINES************************

"U.S. Backs Florida's New Counterterrorism Database" 

"S.J. Police Cautious on Use of Stun Guns" 

"Official: National Network to be Up by Next Year" 

"Lehigh Professor's Insight Could Give Military New Vision" 

"New Tools Will Give Deputies Some Added Zap" 

"Homeland Security Courts Silicon Valley" 

"New Police Guns Will Fire Beanbags" 

"On the Trail of Criminals, the Little Things Add Up" 

"Surveillance Proposal Expanded" 

"WVC Police Getting the Word Out" 

"On Chicago Streets, Cameras Are Watching" 

"Federal Data Searches on Hit List" 

"Robotics to Play Major Role in Future Warfighting" 

"Prisons Go for Open Source" 

"Niche Focus on Security Market With New Headcam" 

"US Passports to Carry Digitally Signed Images" 

"Dialed In" 

"Tulsa Police Get the Write Stuff" 

***************************ARTICLES*************************

"U.S. Backs Florida's New Counterterrorism Database" 
Washington Post (08/06/03) P. A1; O'Harrow Jr., Robert 

Florida's Multistate Anti-Terrorism Information Exchange
(Matrix) counterterrorism database is being developed as a
resource that national law enforcement agencies can use to
scan billions of available records about both lawbreakers
and innocent citizens in order to rapidly find patterns of
suspicious activity. "The power of this technology--to take
seemingly isolated bits of data and tie them together to get
a clear picture in seconds--is vital to strengthening our
domestic security," insists former commissioner of the
Florida Department of Law Enforcement James Moore. The
Matrix program is slated to be extended nationally via a $4
million grant from the Justice Department and an $8 million
grant from the Homeland Security Department, but civil
liberties advocates are worried that the deployment of such
a system will give the government even more latitude to
infringe on Americans' privacy. The Matrix system is similar
in concept to the Pentagon's Terrorism Information Awareness
program, which became so contentious an issue that
legislators severely cut the project's funding. The Matrix
system was developed by Seisint under the authorization of
company founder Hank Asher, who refused to accept financial
compensation, according to Phil Ramer, special agent in
charge of statewide intelligence. Seisint President Paul S.
Cameron says concerns of Matrix's potential for privacy
infringement are inflated, considering that the police have
long had access to the records the system would tap into.
Ramer does not deny that Matrix could be misused, but vowed
that the system would be used discreetly. More controversy
has erupted over Asher's past as a drug smuggler and an
informant, and Jennie Khoen of Florida's Department of Law
Enforcement calls it "prudent and responsible for us to do a
comprehensive review of his background."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21872-2003Aug5.html 

"S.J. Police Cautious on Use of Stun Guns" 
San Jose Mercury News (08/04/03) P. A1; Woolfolk, John 

More than 200 police departments across the United States
have distributed Taser stun guns to all officers, but the
city of San Jose, Calif., chose not to do so. The city now
has 88 Tasers for 1,400 officers, and intends to acquire 22
more so each of the 100 patrol units has access to a stun
gun. Police say if a stun gun is necessary, an officer can
obtain one within 15 minutes. Law enforcement officials add
that a recent incident involving the shooting of a woman
threatening an officer could not have been prevented with a
Taser. Officers were told about a young child alone in the
street, but encountered a frenzied woman who brought out an
Asian vegetable peeler. The use of pepper spray or a club
would not have immobilized the attacker, police say, and
Tasers work only if the darts properly affix to the target.
But in Phoenix, Ariz, the decision to equip the entire force
with Tasers reduced the number of people shot by police
there to eight in 2003, compared to 15 in the first half of
2002. Phoenix witnessed 30 police shootings in 2002, one of
the highest rates in the nation; half of them resulted in
death.
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/6453591.htm 

"Official: National Network to be Up by Next Year" 
Associated Press (08/03/03); Falkenberg, Lisa 

A national network to help find missing children using radio
and television broadcasts and electronic highway signs
should go live by this time next year, announced Deborah
Daniels, assistant U.S. attorney general in the Office of
Justice Programs, during the first national training
conference on the Amber Alert. However, Daniels said
communications between states still needs to improve, and
added that the conference was also intended to allow teams
from all 50 states and six U.S. territories to familiarize
themselves with each other's Amber Alert systems. Other
issues addressed at the conference included cost-effective
technology to improve the system, and the dangers of
overusing the system and desensitizing the public. Another
speaker extolling the virtues of the Amber Alert system was
17-year-old Tamara Brooks, who was kidnapped along with
Jacqueline Marris last August in California. Brooks and
Marris were rescued by Kern County sheriff's deputies partly
thanks to Amber Alert, and co-chairman of Oregon's emergency
communication committee Chris Murray said the incident was
the impetus many other states needed to get their own
programs up and running. http://www.ap.org 

"Lehigh Professor's Insight Could Give Military New Vision" 
Allentown Morning Call (08/02/03) P. A1; Gostomski,
Christina 

Equipped with about $300,000 in grants from the U.S. Army,
Lehigh University professor Rick Blum has refined a system
that could help law enforcement agencies identify hidden
weapons. The system relies on conventional digital video
cameras, millimeter-wave cameras, and PCs that run
algorithm-based software. The system successfully combines
images produced from the two types of cameras, resulting in
pictures that show faces and apparel as well as weapons
concealed under clothing or in walls. The millimeter-wave
cameras use a special type of radar developed by the
military. However, the cost of building such systems is
currently too prohibitive unless a commercial firm invests
in producing the systems on a large scale, according to
Blum. Moreover, such a system would have to be transportable
and not excessively bulky. Meanwhile, Blum is working on a
similar system that combines standard digital images with
night vision images and relies on smaller algorithms. Bill
Sander of the Army Research Office in Durham, N.C., who was
instrumental in securing the grant for Blum, expects it will
take more than a year before the system can be launched on
the market.
http://www.mcall.com/news/local/all-a1_5imageaug02,0,136767.story?coll=all-news-hed 

"New Tools Will Give Deputies Some Added Zap" 
St. Petersburg Times (FL) (08/01/03) P. 7; Amrhein, Saundra 

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office received 60 of 252
Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) it plans to
purchase within the next two years and will use a federal
law enforcement grant to purchase 257 Tasers. The AEDs
normalizes the heartbeat of heart attack victims via an
electric charge. The devices will be distributed to patrol
officers--which are often the first emergency personnel to
assist a heart attack victim--in addition to courthouses,
sheriff's buildings, and detention centers. Pasco sheriff's
Cpl. Dan Dede and Kurt Conover, chairman of the Heart
Association's AED program, helped to raise $117,300 to
purchase the defibrillators, including approximately $49,000
for neighboring Hernando County. The total purchase cost for
both counties is $750,000, which the Heart Association plans
to cover. Dede said the devices can prevent brain damage in
most heart attack victims by restoring oxygen supply to the
brain in the crucial minutes following a heart attack. The
Sheriff's office will also have enough Tasers to equip all
patrol deputies with the devices, at a cost of roughly
$140,000.
http://www.sptimes.com/2003/08/01/Pasco/New_tools_will_give_d.shtml 

"Homeland Security Courts Silicon Valley" 
CNet (07/31/03); Gilbert, Alorie 

Silicon Valley technology firms and entrepreneurs caught in
an IT spending downturn could have reason to smile with the
Department of Homeland Security's announcement of a roughly
$1 billion budget for academic and private-sector research
and development projects focusing on technology that could
fortify the national infrastructure and enhance defensive
and responsive measures to terrorist incidents. Homeland
Security Advanced Research Projects Agency (HSARPA) deputy
director Jane Alexander told tech executives at Veritas
Software's headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., that
projects must adhere to certain criteria in order to qualify
for funding. The technology must be relatively cheap if it
is to be widely used by local law enforcement and emergency
workers; the technology must be incapable of generating
false positives if its purpose is to identify the signs of a
terror attack; and the technology must be able to adjust to
protocols and infrastructure that may vary between states
and local governments. Alexander noted that HSARPA will
concentrate heavily on technology that facilitates the
detection and handling of bioterrorism threats, but will
also listen to proposals designed to aid domestic disaster
response by the Coast Guard, the Federal Emergency
Management Agency, and other security-related departments
and entities. Alexander reported that her staff have been
flooded with more than 3,000 proposals sent to HSARPA. The
deputy director said that HSARPA, unlike the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), will focus on
technology concepts that can be developed within a
relatively short time--six months to two years.
http://news.com.com/2100-1020_3-5058618.html 

"New Police Guns Will Fire Beanbags" 
Des Moines Register (07/31/03) P. 1B; Alex, Tom 

The police department of Des Moines, Iowa, is paying around
$4,000 for 12 shotguns that fire beanbags. The projectiles
have three times the approximately 20-foot range of the
department's 12 Taser guns, according to Sgt. Todd Dykstra.
However, Iowa Law Enforcement Academy instructor Gil Hansen
warns that the beanbag guns could have a lethal effect in
certain situations. Des Moines' beanbags will be outfitted
with tails to prevent tumbling, which experimentation shows
can cause the projectile to tear through targets. Sgt. Joe
Cerruto reports no problems among police in Cedar Rapids
using the beanbags. For the moment, Des Moines police's
nonlethal arsenal, in addition to Tasers, includes chemical
sprays and metal batons, Dykstra says.
http://desmoinesregister.com/news/stories/c4788993/21816199.html 

"On the Trail of Criminals, the Little Things Add Up" 
Dallas Morning News (07/31/03) P. 1R; Anderson, Karin Shaw 

Forensic investigators in Garland, Texas, contrary to
popular fiction and prime-time television shows, do not
solve crimes, but they do collect, document, and preserve
evidence, according to investigator Tara McGary. Tools the
Garland Police Department uses to analyze the evidence
include a fuming chamber, magnetic black powder, ninhydrin,
luminol, and other equipment. The fuming chamber is used to
coat samples with Super Glue; the black powder and ninhydrin
are employed to uncover fingerprints; and luminol makes
blood and other bodily fluids luminescent. Any fingerprints
or partial prints the investigators find are matched to
possible suspects using the Automated Fingerprint
Identification System. Although the system provides
investigators with possible matches, humans are needed to
decipher the subtle differences. Garland's forensic police
officers investigated 6,000 cases in 2002 and were called in
for 300 on-scene probes in July alone.
http://www.dallasnews.com 

"Surveillance Proposal Expanded" 
Washington Post (07/31/03) P. E1; O'Harrow Jr., Robert 

Government officials want to expand the application of the
CAPPS II passenger screening system, which could potentially
become the largest surveillance network ever created by the
government, but limit the information gathered on each
individual. The new proposal was meant to mollify critics
who worried about privacy issues. Under the current
proposal, CAPPS II would not only use commercial information
services to mine commercial and demographic data to identify
potential terrorists, but would also be used to find violent
offenders. Terrorist suspects' records would then be further
checked against classified government systems. Electronic
Privacy Information Center general counsel David L. Sobel
says the new proposal turns CAPPS II from a terrorist
screening system to a "massive enforcement mechanism."
Center for Democracy and Technology executive director James
X. Dempsey says officials will always be tempted to expand
the scope of such a system. CAPPS II has been delayed over
questions about the technology to be used and the system's
danger to privacy, especially the length of time data would
be held, but Homeland Security officials say the rewritten
proposal clears the way for CAPPS II to launch this fall
after pilots this summer. Homeland Security privacy officer
Nuala O'Connor Kelly notes that the new CAPPS II rules allow
individuals to access records that have been used to
implicate them, a measure she says ensures fair and
legitimate use.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A4978-2003Jul30.html 

"WVC Police Getting the Word Out" 
Salt Lake Tribune (07/31/03) P. C6; Canham, Matt 

West Valley City, Utah, police expect to reduce the time
needed to make police reports by 50 percent by giving all
patrol officers high-end digital recorders. The officers
will be able to perform more patrols with the time saved
from not having to type or travel to a police station,
according to Assistant Chief Craig Gibson. The audio reports
are transcribed in order of importance after they are
downloaded into a shared network. All officers can then
access the reports via their laptops. The recorders enable
officers to build separate files for each case, while the
recordings are paired up with typewritten reports. Gibson
says giving the proper narrative portion of the report
without too much duplication is the hardest part for
officers. He notes that the records department's 21-member
staff is being trained to boost report uniformity by sifting
through jargon. The department's total investment for the
digital recorders, which cost $230 per unit, is over
$18,000. West Valley City police will evaluate the new
recorders' effectiveness by studying how quickly officers
respond to incidents and how much time they spend on patrol.
http://www.sltrib.com/2003/jul/07312003/utah/79904.asp 

"On Chicago Streets, Cameras Are Watching" 
Christian Science Monitor (07/30/03) P. 1; Buchanan, Andrew 

Chicago is the biggest city so far to employ surveillance
cameras against crime, and while some people applaud their
use, others say that they offer a false sense of security
and erode the right to privacy. "You put the cameras up
today, then you start adding facial recognition technology,
then you start recording it, then you don't just use them in
high-crime areas," says the ACLU's Ed Yohnka. The aftermath
of the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States
has increased the use of surveillance cameras in various
neighborhoods, and now Chicago is using a system that lets
police officers with laptop computers in their squad cars
access the system, as part of the city's fight against
homicide, gangs, and drug activity. The Chicago cameras are
protected by bulletproof glass, and can see at night and
rotate 360 degrees. The cameras are marked by flashing blue
lights, and can be moved by police. Some observers say that
terrorism fears have shifted things away from civil
liberties, while police and advocates say that they are
guarding against the misuse of the technology--the
International Association of Chiefs of Police has created
policy guidelines for technology use and offers courses for
officers. "You don't have a presumption of privacy in public
sections of the city," says association researcher John
Firman, who adds that privacy issues should not draw fire as
long as camera usage is dictated by proper protocols.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0730/p01s02-usgn.html 

"Federal Data Searches on Hit List" 
Wired News (07/29/03); Singel, Ryan 

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) is working with a wide range of
privacy groups to restrict data mining of federal and
commercial databases by the CIA and the Defense, Homeland
Security, and Treasury departments. His newly drafted
Citizens' Protection in Federal Databases Act would prohibit
agents from fishing in databases for people who fit a
particular profile, instead allowing them to only search for
information on already-identified suspects. In addition, any
federal agency that did not report to Congress about new
database programs within 60 days would have its funding
suspended. Wyden already succeeded in freezing the
Pentagon's Terrorism Information Awareness (TIA) program by
attaching provisions to a Defense Department spending bill.
According to records won by lawsuit, the Electronic Privacy
Information Center (EPIC) says a limited number of FBI
offices searched public records--such as credit bureaus,
LexisNexis, Westlaw, and ChoicePoint--67,932 times in 2000.
Extrapolating from that information, all FBI offices made a
total of 1,698,300 public records searches in that same
year, searches the agency says contributed to a number of
captured fugitives. Still, EPIC's David Sobel says the
public is not ready to sacrifice privacy yet for increased
security, even after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He says
Wyden's efforts have strong public backing, as evidenced by
the backlash against TIA and CAPPS II, a passenger flight
screening system.
http://wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,59824,00.html 

"Robotics to Play Major Role in Future Warfighting" 
United States Joint Forces Command (07/29/03); Schafer, Ron 

A study being conducted by the U.S. Joint Forces Command's
Project Alpha think tank suggests that integrated autonomous
machines may become a standard component of battlefield
tactics by 2025. Project Alpha organized a Johns Hopkins
University workshop where artificial intelligence and
robotics experts convened to develop a basic outline for
robot battlefield deployment and make the Defense Department
more aware of robot technology's possible war applications.
The think tank's Unmanned Effects Leader Gordon Johnson
explains that one objective of the study is to promote the
creation of a DoD office that would oversee the
implementation of robotics technology throughout the entire
military, rather than have separate divisions risk
incompatibility by developing isolated robotics programs.
The study is also supposed to articulate the advantages of
tactical autonomous combatants, such as their ability to
operate in multiple environments, weather tough
environmental conditions, and function in areas saturated
with radioactivity as well as chemical and biological
contaminants. Johnson also points out that robots offer
greater mobility, can react faster and cost less than
humans, and possess unmatched sensing capabilities. Project
Alpha director Russ Richards says that battlefield robots
will probably not be humanoid, but will instead be
configured into shapes designed to "optimize their use for
the roles and missions they will perform." He adds that the
biggest challenge to widescale acceptance of robots in the
military is likely to be changing cultural attitudes that
favor the human element, although he notes that autonomous
machines such as "smart" weapons are already replacing
humans in certain capacities. Richards warns that the United
States should not fall behind other countries' efforts to
incorporate robots into their armed forces.
http://www.jfcom.mil/newslink/storyarchive/2003/pa072903.htm 

"Prisons Go for Open Source" 
New Zealand Herald (07/29/03); Wood, Richard 

New Zealand's Department of Corrections began developing an
intranet system several months ago and is now ready to
launch the system around mid August. The system is equipped
with OpenCMS software to enhance access to system reports.
Associate Minister for Justice Rick Barker recently
implemented the Justice Information Strategy 2003-2006 to
enhance data exchanges between departments and to further
other technology-related improvements began by the 1996
strategy. Green MP Nandor Tanczos supports evaluating the
benefits of non-proprietary software, but Barker indicated
the justice sector favors proprietary solutions because the
are easier to use. The Department of Corrections is limiting
its software goals to the OpenCMS solution for now, while
the Ministry of Justice has also restricted its open-source
software plans.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/businessstorydisplay.cfm?storyID=3515085&thesection=business&thesubsection=technology&thesecondsubsection=information 

"Niche Focus on Security Market With New Headcam" 
Albany Business Review (07/28/03); D'Errico, Richard A. 

Troy, N.Y.-based Niche Concepts is offering a tiny,
high-resolution camera that interoperates with
facial-recognition software from Acsys Biometrics of
Ontario, Canada. Newark, N.J.-based CyberExtruder provides
3-D images for the camera. The $1,950 JonesCAM LX weighs but
an ounce and is only two inches long by 5/16th of an inch in
diameter. The camera is ideally suited for first responders
and law enforcement agents because it transmits high-quality
images while giving the operator control over functions such
as color balance and light settings. The camera allows users
to match facial-recognition images from the camera to law
enforcement databases. Officials with state and local
governments have been purchasing the cameras, says Niche CEO
Michael Jones, and the camera has already been demonstrated
for the FBI, New York Homeland Security officials, and New
York State Troopers. A New York City hospital is intrigued
enough that it may consider using the camera for surgical
procedures. The security applications for the camera are
enormous, says Jones, who is attempting to sell the camera
to border-crossing patrols.
http://albany.bizjournals.com/albany 

"US Passports to Carry Digitally Signed Images" 
New Scientist (07/23/03); Knight, Will 

The U.S. governments plans to issue "smart" passports,
featuring embedded microchips that store a compressed image
of the owner's face, to U.S. citizens in October 2004.
Designed to prevent tampering, the digital passports will
include cryptographically signed digital images to guarantee
their authenticity. Although civil liberties groups have
expressed concerns about the government using the new
passports as a monitoring tool, Frank Moss, deputy assistant
secretary for Passport Services at the U.S. Department of
State, maintains that information will only be forwarded to
centralized databases if there is a query over the
authenticity of a passport. What is more, Moss says the
passports will only include basic passport information. Some
technical experts have also warned that smart passports do
not guarantee safety, adding that the new passports will
only help to identify known suspects or people who have
forged passports. Richard Clayton, a hardware security
expert at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom, adds
that everyone involved in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks had
a photo ID. Meanwhile, the European Union plans to spend 140
million euros to develop an interoperable biometric system,
which would enable passports to carry fingerprints and iris
scan biometric data. Such biometric information would be
much easier to cross-reference than photographs of an
individual with different hair styles and facial hair.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993975 

"Dialed In" 
Government Technology (07/03) Vol. 16, No. 9, P. 19;
Newcombe, Tod 

One of the key planks in New York City Mayor Michael R.
Bloomberg's successful campaign for the office was to
establish a single 311 telephone number for residents to
call to receive city services, a task that requires the
centralization of 40 different call centers in order to
establish the 311 service, which is expected to handle up to
30,000 calls in 170 languages around the clock. Bloomberg's
other requirements for the new service, which will operate
out of a 45,000 square foot operations center, are that each
caller be able to talk to a live operator and that each call
is answered within three rings, with a goal of answering 80
percent of calls within five minutes. In order to meet the
mayor's demand that the call center be up and running within
just a few months, the city awarded Accenture a contract to
help deal with telephony, customer contact software
implementation, call center development, and overall
re-engineering of business processes. Starting out with the
call-center software that was already used in several city
agencies, Accenture also implemented computer-telephony
integration software, contact management tools, and a PBX
solution. The toughest part of the project was establishing
a knowledge database that 311 operators could use to find
answers to all the questions involved, a task that required
the city and Accenture to develop more than 6,800 lines of
content for operators to work with. The 311 service has been
in operation for some months now, bringing in a steadily
increasing number of calls as word about the service
spreads, and operators quickly found themselves dealing with
a wide variety of situations--including a number of parking
complaints on Sundays, when churchgoers would often be found
double-parking or blocking driveways. Calls to the 311
service are assigned different tiers, with tier one being
general questions and information requests, while tier two
is full service requests. In response to full-service
requests, the caller is given a tracking number to be used
for later calls to the 311 service to get status updates; in
addition, status updates will eventually be available by
tracking number via the city's Web site.
http://www.govtech.net/magazine/story.php?id=57827 

"Tulsa Police Get the Write Stuff" 
Government Technology (07/03) 

Oklahoma-based Tulsa Police Department officers can now use
a new $1.4 million wireless data radio network to write
field interviews, incident reports, and accident reports,
significantly boosting their efficiency. Tulsa's wireless
infrastructure allows the Department's 450 police laptops,
docking stations in police vehicles, and vehicular radio
modems to communicate, and provides officers with data from
local, state, and federal databases. Officers no longer rely
on radio communication to check warrant information, which
means potentially dangerous situations are avoided with the
officer receiving valuable knowledge. The online capability
replaces the previous time-consuming method of submitting
paper documents, explains Department systems development and
support manager George Smith. "Officer efficiency has
increased both on the street and in the office, freeing up
time to do what they do best--serve and protect our
citizens," he boasts.
http://www.govtech.net/news/news.phtml?docid=2003.07.22-60993 

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