How Much Protection Do CCTV Cameras Offer?

May 2008 - A senior UK police office has complained that the use of CCTV cameras has a minimal impact on crime figures.

In truth, many of us in the UK would have suggested this and probably we all know this deep down. There are a number of crime related television shows - in which the general public are asked to assist police. Often these shows use CCTV pictures as part of their evidence. And yet, invariably, the pictures from these cameras are of very little use.

It seems that unless a criminal is willing to stand a few feet from a camera and look straight at it, the picture will not be able to identify him or her. How often do criminals do that?

To read more about this, please visit this BBC Story

Whilst it may seem that the link between CCTV cameras and a website about identity theft is tenuous, the civil liberties implications are wide and it is this area that links the two topics.

The next wave of identity theft s almost certainly going to revolve around identity cards, which New Labour plans to introduce. With all that information stored in one place, it will be the Holy Grail for ID fraudsters to be able to crack the protection and gain access to masses of sensitive information.

Yet we the general public, are 'sold' the identity cards message on the basis that it will help to secure us. These are the same protections that CCTV cameras were meant to provide and now seem to be failing at.

In the meantime, personal information is recorded about individuals almost everywhere with little effort to curtail the spread of the details.

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