Police force announces surveillance overhaul

Staffordshire Police is set to complete a major network upgrade that will allow it to make better use of video and CCTV footage to pinpoint crime hotspots.

The new 100 megabit core voice over IP (VoIP) network will support the transfer of CCTV and video images across the wide area network (WAN), as well as allowing better linkage of intelligence databases.

Phil Lovell, head of technology services at Staffordshire Police, said current and predicted future usage had exceeded the old two megabit core network installed in 1992.

“The usage of that network has increased over the last ten years at around about 100 per cent per year. We have got to the stage now whereby we couldn’t cope with what we’re doing. Our networks were exhausted with the amount of voice and data we were putting across them,” he said.

One of the uses of the network will be linking roadside automatic number plate reader cameras to back-end databases.

Lovell said: “It then sends that image to the back-end database and compares it against what is on the database. If a car is on there in respect of being stolen or of interest it will flag it to us.”

The upgrade will also provide better access to core systems for police force staff operating from remote locations, improved links with intelligence data systems from other forces, and cope with future technology developments such as the adoption of the Airwave police radio system.

He explained: “It is the biggest IT upgrade for ten years, therefore we wanted to install a new network that could grow with our organisation, particularly as we have Airwave, the new national police radio, coming down the line.”

Mitel Networks and Pinacl Solutions have integrated Staffordshire’s current Siemens iSDX voice switches and added Cisco Layer 3 data switches that allow it prioritise applications over the WAN.

The project, which cost “under a million pounds”, is due to go live at the end of May across 23 sites.