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Over in the U.K., closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras are a ubiquitous sight: the country—led by London—has more of the tiny public surveillance cameras than any other country in Europe. They're now a part of pop culture and are referenced in songs, used as album artwork, and in the case of one intrepid band, used to make a music video.
The latest zinger in the debate over the effectiveness of CCTV is that, well, they’re not that effective after all. Detective chief inspector Mick Neville of Scotland Yard, metropolitan London’s police force, called the assumed crime-deterrents an “utter fiasco” earlier this week, adding that the cameras have only helped to solve 3 percent of street robberies and that people aren’t really camera-shy when it comes to committing crimes in public. (CCTV footage did, it's nonetheless worth noting, help British police successfully investigate terrorism suspects in the July 2005 London transit bombings.)
For Torontonians, soon to be monitored on and in TTC buses, subways, streetcars, and stations, this should be a point of contention. Ontario’s privacy commissioner has already addressed Big Brother concerns by recommending annual audits, and that footage be deleted after three days (unless it’s being used in an investigation). And unlike in London and other major cities, Toronto transit cameras won’t be manned, reducing the likelihood of abuse by peeping Toms, stalkers, jealous ex-partners, and the bored. But if London, a city that is infamous for its use of surveillance cameras, continues to have to incorporate even more measures (including the ability to track distinctive logos on clothing and posting stills of suspects online), how effective will the initiative be in Toronto?
Neville's admission bolsters the Toronto Public Space Committee’s claim that cameras don’t deter crime. Still, Scotland Yard isn’t writing off the cameras, they’re just arguing for more advanced surveillance technology. Nonetheless, the announcement is a big hint to the TTC and Toronto police that in a city with three times less people to monitor than London and perennial funding complaints, it might be more effective to just kick it old school and get police and transit officers in the streets and subways so they can deter crime and deal with it if it happens.
Photo by room929 from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.
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I lived in Brighton, England for many years. It's a big party town on the south coast with two universities and a constant stream of revelers from London and it was heavily CCTV'ed in the 90s.
The cameras did make a difference, reducing petty crimes and helping catch people involved in fights outside night clubs. It certainly felt a lot safer around the equivalent of Toronto's 'Entertainment District'. I'm not sure the point of them was ever prevention, the kind of crimes you get in those areas are fueled by drink and drugs and cameras are unlikely to be a deterrent, but unlike Toronto's these cameras were monitored live and police were able to distribute their resources better based on information from camera operators.
In that kind of context they seemed to work. I'm not sure that they were ever intended as a deterrent, at least not in Brighton. While I know little about London's experience with CCTV beyond the bombings, but I'm not sure that the point of their cameras would be as a deterrent either. Most of these 'petty' crimes, like muggings, b&e, fights, etc are caused by drink, drugs, or the desire for either of those things, and these days so many people carry cameras it's hard not to expect to be filmed doing something in public. Unmanned cameras will be a lot less of a deterrent than someone across the street with a cell phone. This announcement, emphasizing the deterrent value of the systems, seems odd to me, but I suppose they are asking for more money.
Toronto's system seems to be stuck in a place where there aren't enough of them to be useful in a citywide event, like the London bombings, and the cameras there are (several have just been installed at Queen and Bathurst this week) aren't monitored, which means they can't be used to direct police resources or properly sighted even if they are in an area with a crime in progress, they just have to hope the camera was pointed in the right direction, which seems ridiculous. I know there are privacy concerns about live-monitored cameras but if you're going to have them they should be monitored or the effectiveness of them is completely compromised. Realistically I would worry a lot less about the potential for abuse of police cameras by police operators, who would themselves be monitored, than I would from the thousands of CCTV cameras in private hands. Car parks for example use technology that tracks individuals throughout their system and looks for patterns of behaviour, such as lingering, to determine if they are a threat. These kind of systems don't have mandated monitoring.
More officers on the streets is certainly a more benign alternative, and some countries do install policemen at intersections and have them stand there all day, doing much the same job a camera would do. But I'm ignorant to the relative costs.
Overall, CCTV is a nasty signification for any society and it's natural to be somewhat repulsed, but I'm not against them when used effectively (live monitored) in an area like the Entertainment District, where I used to live and once came home to find someone had been stabbed to death on my doorstep. Outside of those 'problem' areas I'm not so sure. Again, I'm no expert, but compared to somewhere like Brighton Toronto's crime problems don't seem to have a location. As we've seen even this year shootings take place across the city and don't seem to be predictable in any way. CCTV doesn't seem to be the right solution for Toronto.
I used to live in London, there were cameras everywhere and they didn't bother anyone. They're just there, no one is going to be seeing if you adjust your wedgie or anything.
There was also a nail-bomb incident in Soho in 1999, I think. The cameras helped find the person responsible. No one talks about that because it's not a "terrorist" attack, though it was very probably a hate crime seeing that Soho is the gay district in London.
Miles: CCTV is not a solution period. CCTV did not prevent the transit bombings in London it only helped to capture the people that did the nasty deed. Essentially, it's the government waiting for people to do something illegal and catching them on camera. Hardly pro-active policing.
Maybe not pro-active, but likely useful. Remember that murder last year on the subway? All they had to go by were dollar store webcam quality images from the station the suspect got off.
Between that incident, the one on the bus just a few weeks later after (if i recall the proper time frame) and the shooting on the subway a few weeks back I don't think it's too hard to see why this might be a good idea, in at least identifying suspects.
Vincent, CCTV is not a deterrent solution, I'm not sure anyone's saying that, but that doesn't make it ineffective as a tool for police when used correctly. When CCTV was introduced in England it wasn't introduced as a deterrent but as a tool to catch criminals. I suspect the focus being put on CCTV in this announcement has more to do with what the police want next.
I agree that it's not proactive policing at all. I still think in lieu of this, it would be advantageous to have police officers around. Not just standing on corner but also engaging with the public, patrolling, etc.
Not to downplay violent incidents but I still think we can get rather hysterical about crime in this city sometimes. CCTV will not prevent crime at all and if that really is what the London police thought then they really weren't considering the bravado element of petty crime (and drunken tomfoolery as Miles mentioned above). At the same time, if it means actually apprehending people after the fact then it's hard to argue against it.
With regards to the subway shooting a few weeks ago, it looks like the suspects were caught due to images of them caught on camera: http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_22486.aspx
I've seen fights break out in the entertainment district, mere steps from cops patrolling on foot AND on horseback, all under the watchful eye of the many police surveillance cameras in the area. Even police on the ground can't put a stop to drunken shenanigans. How effective would more cameras be? They might help solve crimes after the fact and that's beneficial if you consider the number of serious crimes that go unsolved. But for rowdy clubbers, the effect will be minimal. Also, if Toronto were to implement the same sort of widespread CCTV system, I would hope that the city and the police would remember that crime prevention would remain a serious issue and that the cameras do not affect it in any way.