Subject: [NEXTEL-1] In this wealthy town, cameras record every visitor- Camreas Run NCIC onevery car?

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 2004 14:39:17 -0400

Posted on Fri, Apr. 30, 2004        
    
In this wealthy town, cameras record every visitor

BY NOAH BIERMAN
Knight Ridder Newspapers

MANALAPAN, Fla. - (KRT) - One of the nation's richest towns has decided
to 
digitally record the license plate of every car that meanders through
its small 
stretch of mansions on the Palm Beach County, Fla., coast and to run an 
automatic background check on each driver.

Strategically placed cameras will take infrared photos that record a
driver's 
tag number. Software will automatically run the numbers through law 
enforcement databases and alert a 911 dispatcher if the driver is in a
stolen car or is 
the subject of a "be on the lookout" warning.

If there's a robbery, police will be able to comb records to determine
who 
drove through town on a given afternoon or evening. Next to the tag
number, 
police will have a picture of the driver, taken with another set of
cameras, 
upgraded versions of the standard surveillance cameras already in place.

Manalapan's town council authorized $60,000 in security upgrades last
week 
after three burglaries this winter robbed residents of $400,000 in
jewelry. The 
town averages two or three burglaries per year and residents demanded
swift 
response, said Town Manager Gregory Dunham. The 2000 Census listed
Manalapan 
among the nation's richest cities, with two out of every three homes
worth more 
than $500,000.

Enter the PIPS Technology camera, developed in England with a large
operation 
in Knoxville, Tenn. PIPS is among several companies that claim their
machines 
can capture license plate digits from cars speeding faster than 100 mph 
through rain, sleet, snow, darkness or fog.

Manalapan is the second Florida city that will put the PIPS equipment on
a 
public road. PIPS Vice President Craig Cantrell said the town of Palm
Beach has 
been testing it since December. A spokeswoman for the department
declined to 
comment.

England's bobbies have been more aggressive, mounting plate cameras on
patrol 
cars to scan for outlaws since the 1990s. Experts say bold and simple 
European tags are easier for a camera to interpret than America's busy
and varied 
tags. The PIPS system, for example, has trouble distinguishing between
states 
because that information may be printed lightly or not at all on the
tag.

"It is a very daunting task to teach a machine to recognize numbers,"
said 
Lee J. Nelson, principal systems consultant for Electro-Optical
Technologies, 
Inc. in Falls Church, Va.

Police Chief Clay Walker said his dispatchers will look at the plate
numbers 
that trigger their alarm system to make sure they match the
corresponding 
photos of the cars before sending police after them.

They'd better be right. Agencies around the country have been forced to
offer 
sheepish apologies after misreading license plates and chasing down
innocent 
people.

Walker says that if all goes well with the first phase - placing two
cameras 
on a quiet road that leads to the island's "point" neighborhood - he'll
put a 
camera directly on the A1A highway, so that everyone who passes through
the 
busy area will be recorded.

It's one of the more extreme examples of how technology - be it a home 
computer, a SunPass transponder, or a cellphone - is changing the nature
of personal 
privacy. The technology planned for Manalapan, Fla., has been in
development 
for decades but is just emerging as a security tool in this country.

SunPass has been using license plate cameras since 1999 to make sure
people 
pay turnpike tolls. Miami International Airport began using them in
November to 
make sure people don't underpay for long-term parking.

Miami-Dade police are looking into using the technology but could not
provide 
details about their plans.

"Courts have ruled that in a public area, you have no expectation of 
privacy," said Walker, one of 11 sworn officers who protects Manalapan's
321 
residents.

Walker is no J. Edgar Hoover. He has his own concerns about the freedoms 
Americans gave up with the passage of the USA Patriot Act. He says
Manalapan's 
data will be destroyed every three months and that his officers are
sensitive to 
discrimination concerns.

Still, civil libertarians worry about the potential to put innocent
drivers 
on an electronic lineup just because they happen to drive along the
beach.

"It's just more of the Big Brother act," said Maria Laneve, 29, a
bartender 
at Callaro's Prime Steak and Seafood, in the town's only shopping
center.

Rich Wishart, a 40-year-old waiter, said, "If you're not doing anything 
wrong, you've got nothing to worry about."

"These people have a lot invested in this community," he added.

In Tampa, Fla.'s, Ybor City neighborhood, police installed facial
recognition 
technology in 2001. Cameras and software were designed to match facial 
features of passers-by with a database of wanted persons. They scrapped
the program 
last year after it raised the ire of privacy advocates but failed to
catch a 
single criminal.

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/nation/8559531.htm?1c

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