Technology Helps Police Departments Comply with Civilian Data Privacy Laws
CHICAGO - Truleo, the leading provider of automated body camera review and analysis technology for law enforcement, today announced the release of Responsible Transcription™, a process that automatically separates and redacts civilian data during body camera transcription.
Truleo processes body camera videos for departments across the country to help automate supervision, facilitate coaching, and promote police professionalism. The technology automatically detects risky events such as use of force, pursuits, frisking, and non-compliance incidents, and screens for both professional and unprofessional officer language for supervisors to praise or review.
Many police departments around the country transcribe their body camera videos but do not separate officer language from civilian language. Raw transcription not only creates an administrative burden of having to sort through false positives trying to decipher what was said by the officer, but it may soon also require the department to redact any personally identifiable civilian data (PII) that was transcribed.
Since the start of 2023, at least 15 biometric privacy law proposals have emerged across 11 states with the stated goal of protecting civilian privacy. Earlier this month, on March 3 California Assembly Member Lori Wilson amended her bill AB 1034, on facial recognition and other biometric surveillance, to include banning law enforcement from installing “surveillance systems” in connection with their body cameras. “Surveillance information” is defined as personally identifiable civilian data. If this bill passes, it may change the way police departments currently transcribe their body cameras.
Truleo has released a set of capabilities referred to as Responsible Transcription™ that uses several layers of protection to ensure civilian privacy, such as auto-redaction of any civilian PII and filtering out civilian speech entirely. Truleo’s multilayer approach to responsible transcription enables the highest level of civilian privacy within the industry.
“If police departments transcribe their body camera videos, they will likely have to redact civilian PII,” said Anthony Tassone, CEO of Truleo. “We need to dramatically lessen the administrative burden we place on officers. Our ability to separate officer speech from civilian speech, which drives our auto-redaction capability, is another example of our commitment to innovation that helps police officers to do their jobs well while continuing to help protect the public.”
About Truleo
Less than 1% of police body camera videos are reviewed, because there is simply too much data. Truleo automatically processes and converts this data into a training asset for supervisors to help automate supervision and coaching and promote police professionalism. To learn more about Truleo’s mission to improve trust in the police with body camera analytics, visit www.truleo.co.