back to article Cop a load of this: 1TB of police body camera videos found lounging around public databases

In yet another example of absent security controls, troves of police body camera footage were left open to the world for anyone to siphon off, according to an infosec biz. Jasun Tate, CEO of Black Alchemy Solutions Group, told The Register on Monday he and his team had identified about a terabyte of officer body cam videos, …

  1. redpawn

    Are these IOT cameras too?

    Doing it on the cheap, selling for a bundle. No competent oversight, either from the Police Force or the hired companies.

  2. Throatwarbler Mangrove Silver badge
    Trollface

    Clearly false

    Everyone knows that police body cameras fail close to 100% of the time, especially when the police have shot someone.

  3. Steve Knox
    Black Helicopters

    ALL police body cam footage...

    ...should be in public databases. The public paid for it, in more ways than one.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: ALL police body cam footage...

      Went through a jury trial where one bit of evidence was a near 3 hour body cam recording. Seems the jail's normal video system was out, so they fixed the magnetic body cam onto the interview room's metal door frame and carried on. This body cam loudly went BOOP-BOOP every two minutes (warning that you're being recorded), distressing a few with PTSD endlessly, both times we had to see the entire video.

      As for your 'public' !!! The interview was a large part of the evidence in the child abuse case. Fuck yer dogma. The children suffered enough without your gloating over it.

    2. fandom

      Re: ALL police body cam footage...

      Sure, who cares about the privacy of the people that appear on the video?

    3. Lee D Silver badge

      Re: ALL police body cam footage...

      Congratulations.

      You just compromised multiple convictions - whether by allowing witness intimidation for what they did/said, witnesses backing out because their claims are now open to the world, or by sheer vigiliante idiocy based on "what people think that guy actually must have done if he said that".

      Record everything. Store everything. Make it available to the appropriate authorities on demand. That's it. Joe Bloggs doesn't need to see it - he just needs to know that it exists and it can be subpoenaed on demand in a court of law and that serious questions will be asked if it's not available for *any* reason (the UK police often have to drive their cars back to the station if they aren't compliant, e.g. blue lights aren't working properly, or if they have a uniform issue, etc... no reason you can't literally say "if your bodycam fails, you're automatically replaced and recalled to the station to get another working one").

      That way all your "oh, that footage is missing", "oh, they've edited it out" concerns are gone, you can still request access to anything you think contains you and/or things about any incident that you're involved in (that a court says you should be able to see), witnesses get protection, and we don't get idiots thinking they are above the law.

      1. I3N
        Mushroom

        Re: ALL police body cam footage...

        Cop was a dick ... battle of wits on whose cameras were working. Went as far to report my cameras were a zoning violation [weren't]

        When I requested a copy ... Report Not Found

    4. G.Y.

      encrypted Re: ALL police body cam footage...

      But: encrypted hard, only decrypted by court order (or: following policy)

    5. Commswonk

      Re: ALL police body cam footage...

      The public paid for it, in more ways than one.

      The public pays for prisons as well; are we to assume that you want to spend some time in one, like some enormous timeshare?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: enormous timeshare.

        That's one way to look at it, especially since I don't think I'll be able to afford retirement...

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Miscreants grabbed sensitive footage..."

    I think the term Miscreants more correctly applies to the managers in the various police departments who authorised this idiocy.

  5. petethebloke

    Terror?

    Terrabytes? Presumably from an underground operation?

    1. zb

      Re: Terror?

      Maybe it should have been terrorbites - from a rabid ISIS member

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Will there be a few officers sweating nervously ...

    that the "lost" footage which got the assault case against them thrown out might suddenly be "found" here ?

    I bet there are a swarm of defense attorneys poring over the clips looking for cases .....

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not a problem over here due to the 'difficulty' for a number of forces of actually getting the footage off the devices and on to their network... apart from all that footage they sell to TV companies for the emergency services version of 'You've Been Framed'

    Don't bother trawling the dark web... try YouTube, iPlayer, All4, My5 and ITVhub

  8. adam payne

    he and his team had identified about a terabyte of officer body cam videos, stored in unprotected internet-facing databases, belonging to the Miami Police Department, and cops in other US cities as well as places aboard

    Wow just wow.

  9. sum_of_squares
    Devil

    Now add the DeepLearning thingy that strips off the clothes..

    We do live in interesting times, don't we?

  10. Chris G

    No doughnuts were harmed or dunked during the filming of this evidence.

  11. This post has been deleted by its author

  12. Eddy Ito

    I for one am shoc... hardly the least bit surprised. Let me guess, since former Gov. Scott signed the civil asset reform bill the cops now don't have the cash to hire a proper cloud keeper or bookkeeper for that matter. Maybe they'll get creative and find other means to pay for it.

  13. vulture65537

    I wonder if there is any footage included showing someone entering passwords .

  14. 404

    Fucking idiots...

    ... why does this keep happening? This is basic stuff for anyone...

    Although why should I be surprised? All the election commissions in this state failed a pentest organized by the state gov except mine and THAT was with a Win7 network without a server - since then I've installed a new server & locked down the Win7->Win10 installations. Note the county I take care of doesn't have the budget that the others have, but this ISN'T THAT DIFFICULT to stay secured. I just don't get it. Fucking idiots...

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Security needs tightening

    Miami Vice....

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