Community surveillance & Limerick’s Smart CCTV scheme

A Smart CCTV installation in The Square, Newcastle West

I have had a draft blog post lingering for many months addressing some of the issues and concerns with community surveillance, particularly in light of Limerick’s “Smart CCTV” scheme which, I believe, will be a model for a national network of community surveillance.

Quite a lot has since been written (and spoken) about the issue so I include links below to various reports and discussions about the scheme, and some other schemes around the country.

The Data Protection Commission is about to conduct an examination of public sector CCTV schemes nationally. The results of this will be interesting, particularly if one is to interpret anything from the recently-published proposed list of activities that will require a data protection impact assessment under the GDPR (I suggest that one should).

Given the commencement of the GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018, and the forthcoming examination by the DPC, one would think that they State authorities might pause these systems so that a national approach to them could be put in place before expanding their scope further. The opposite seems to be the case.

Media coverage

Other background information

One thought on “Community surveillance & Limerick’s Smart CCTV scheme”

  1. Pingback: Lights, camera, action? – A Clatter of the Law

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