losses to a level that would mean their
investment was recouped within two
years. The authors concluded that anyone buying an off-the-shelf CCTV system may be wasting their money: only
systems designed against a specific
threat in a specific operating environment are effective.
A 2005 study of 13 CCTV systems
funded by the U.K. government for
crime prevention2 concluded they had
little or no impact on crime recorded
by the police, or on citizens’ perception of crime (based on victimization
rates, fear of crime and other information collected via local surveys).
A common problem was that those
who bought the systems were unclear
about the purpose of—and hence the
technical and operating requirements
for—the systems. Many projects were
driven by an “uncritical view that CCTV
was ‘a good thing’ and that specific objectives were unnecessary.” Systems were
bought because funding was available,
or because a neighboring town had purchased one. There was no understanding of what CCTV could achieve, what
types of problems it was best suited to
alleviate, and which configuration and
support technologies work best for
which requirements. With buyers being unclear about objectives and lacking expertise, the systems were generally chosen by the salesperson—who
tended to pick the system that suited
the budget. In day-to-day operations,
it turned out that many cameras were
ineffective because they were badly
placed, broken, dirty, or lighting was
insufficient—problems that were previously identified in London Underground control rooms. 6 Both Gill and
Spriggs2 and McIntosh6 also found that
operator performance in the control
room was hampered by a large number of disparate systems and information sources, and inefficient audio
communication channels. Recent research by my own team5 found these
problems continue to affect operator
performance, as do ever-increasing
camera-to-operator ratios. Recorded
video was generally too poor to be used
for evidence. These problems suggest
CCTV for crime prevention can only
be effective as part of an overall set of
measures and procedures designed to
deal with specific problems. Effective
communication and coordination be-
the effectiveness
of cctV is being
questioned in the
country that has
been a leading and
enthusiastic adopter.
tween CCTV control rooms and those
on the ground (police, shop and bar
staff, private security forces) is key—
and of course there must be sufficient
staff on the ground to respond. And
cameras need clear lines of sight and
sufficient lighting. We found current
practice is still a long way off: cameras
were ineffective because of trees and
shrubs growing in front, and autofo-cus cameras broken because they were
pointed at flags and bunting.
Current research shows that CCTV
for crime prevention is largely ineffective. It is “lazy” to assume that installing
technology solves the problem. It takes
domain knowledge and attention to detail to make security technology work effectively—to date, this has been ignored,
with expensive consequences.
References
1. beck, a., and Willis, a. context-specific measures
of cctV effectiveness in the retail sector. Crime
Prevention Studies 10 (1999), 251–269; http://www.
popcenter.org/library/crimeprevention/volume_10/10-
beckWillis.pdf
2. gill, M. and Spriggs, a. assessing the impact of cctV.
home office research Study 292. Uk home office
research, Development and Statistics Directorate,
February 2005; http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/
pdfs05/hors292.pdf
3. hope, c. ‘ Worthless’ cctV camera footage is not good
enough to fight crime. The Daily Telegraph, (aug. 26,
2009); http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/
politics/6088086/Worthless-cctV-camera-footage-is-
not-good-enough-to-fight-crime-leading-Qc-warns.html
4. keval, h. U. and Sasse, M.a. “Not the usual suspects”:
a study of factors reducing the effectiveness of cctV.
to appear in The Security Journal 23, 2 (apr. 2010);
http://www.palgrave-journals.com/sj/journal/vaop/
ncurrent/abs/ sj20082a.html
5. Luff, P., heath, c., and Jirotka, M. (2000): Surveying
the scene: technologies for everyday awareness
and monitoring in control rooms. Interacting with
Computers 13, (2000), 193–228.
6. Mcintosh, L. Soaring cctV cameras ‘are costly, futile
and politically motivated’. The Times (oct. 13, 2009);
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/
article6871833.ece?token=null&offset= 12&page= 2
M. Angela Sasse ( a.sasse@cs.ucl.ac.uk) is head of
information Security research in the Department of
computer Science at University college London.
copyright held by author.
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