Police Surveillance Technology in Nevada
Which Nevada law enforcement agencies are using surveillance technology in their cities?
Which Nevada law enforcement agencies use surveillance technology?
What surveillance technologies are Nevada law enforcement agencies using?
Hover over each bar to view the type of surveillance technology and which police departments in Nevada use each technology.
Information provided by the Atlas of Surveillance, a project of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Surveillance technology is any type of recording equipment or analytical systems for recorded information that is intended to observe and surveil the public.
Body-worn cameras are the most common surveillance technology used by law enforcement in Nevada. While body-worn cameras are intended to provide physical evidence for police misconduct, the footage obtained on officer’s body-worn cameras often isn’t readily available to the public, even in the face of public backlash.
Just recently in 2020, the Reno and Sparks police departments adopted a policy requiring the release of body-worn camera footage in 14-30 days following an officer involved shooting. Not all cities have these policies in place, and some body-worn camera footage is still behind financial barriers.
Surveillance technology can seem intimidating at first glance. See below for short explanations of each type of technology.
About the technology
Automated License Plate Readers
Automated license plate readers, or ALPRs, are cameras capable of capturing millions of license plate numbers every month, along with the location and time of that capture. This information is kept for anywhere from a few days to a few years, regardless of criminal association with the license plate numbers captured. Read more about automated license plate readers.
Body-worn Cameras
Body-worn cameras are a more common technology used by many police departments across the country. In theory, body-worn cameras are used to keep police officers accountable for hurting or even killing civilians while on the job, but if the footage from these cameras is inaccessible by the public without police department consent, these cameras aren’t serving their purpose. Read more about body-worn cameras.
Camera Registry
Police departments often work in unison with local business or other civilians with private security cameras to build a camera registry. Camera registries allow law enforcement to utilize camera footage of crimes that may not be captured on public cameras, but also give law enforcement access to city-wide, or larger, recordings at any time. Read more about surveillance cameras.
Cell-site Simulator
Cell-site simulators are large devices used to access cell phone communication, geographic data, and some can even change the content of cell phone communication such as texts or emails. Cell-site simulators work by hiding as a real cell-phone tower to trick phones to connecting to the simulator rather than a cell-phone tower. Read more about cell-site simulators.
Drones
Drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles, can be used by police departments and fire departments for more cost-effective surveying of large areas, as opposed to helicopter surveying. However, more often police departments use drones to collect information on protestors, harass their city’s homeless population, or in a strange attempt to fight COVID-19. Read more about drones.
Face Recognition
Face recognition is a type of algorithm used in many different technologies by police departments to identify a person based on facial features. This technology can be used in real time or used with and to create facial recognition databases. This technology is frequently wrong, and has many problems with being unable to correctly identify people of color and women. Read more about face recognition.
Fusion Centers
Fusion centers are large centers combining law enforcement agencies of different jurisdictions in an attempt for these agencies to benefit from sharing information across jurisdictions. However, fusion centers often collect information that can lead to unlawful search and seizures, and increased racial profiling. Fusion centers have unclear regulations because of the multi-jurisdiction nature. Read more about fusion centers.
Gunshot Detection
Gunshot detection technology is intended to record and locate the sound of a gunshot, and inform local law enforcement. Gunshot detection technology often reports false alarms like fireworks or loud cars, and the technology also records human voices, posing a surveillance threat. Read more about gunshot detection.
Real-Time Crime Center
Real-time crime centers (RTCC) are facilities that combine data from multiple surveillance technologies, typically including a live surveillance camera network. These centers are often used for harmful predictive policing strategies. Learn more about real-time crime centers.