Mobile Biometric Technologies
| Submitted | Aug. 17, 2015 |
| Est. Completion | None |
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Communications
From: Dave Maass
Dear Custodian of Records/Public Records Coordinator,
I am collaborating with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a public interest group, and the media organization MuckRock, to survey how law enforcement agencies deploy mobile biometric technologies.
Mobile biometric technologies can be defined as any mobile device or mobile app used by law enforcement agencies to scan, capture, analyze, store, or automatically recognize any physical or biological characteristic of a subject. Commonly used mobile biometric technologies include fingerprint/thumbprint collection, facial recognition, scans of the iris or other elements of the human eye, Rapid DNA, and tattoo recognition. (Please see below for examples.)
Pursuant to the Indiana Access to Public Records Act, I request the following records pertaining to mobile biometric technologies, including those listed above, as well as other biometric technologies I have not identified:
1) Purchasing and procurement documents, including but not limited to: purchase orders, RFPs, responses to RFPs, invoices and contracts
2) Policy, procedural, and training documents, including but not limited to: use policies, standard operating procedures, training materials, presentations, privacy assessments, data retention policies, and other guidelines
3) Programming documents, including but not limited to: funding opportunity announcements, grant applications and grantor status/progress reports, reports to legislative bodies, annual reports
4) Audit documents, including but not limited to: audits of the system, misuse reports, and reports to oversight bodies
In your response, I would appreciate that you individually address each of the above categories of documents individually.
In addition to the above classes of documents, I am also seeking the following information:
- The total number of individuals whose biometric data has been collected over the last three years,
- The total number of [biometric data points] contained in the agency’s database
- The retention period for biometric data
- The number of mobile biometrics devices purchased and in use
- The total number of authorized users of the mobile biometrics devices
- Which external agencies and entities have access to biometric data in the database and under what conditions,
- Whether biometric data is combined with biographic data such as name and address in the database, and
- The process by which data is entered into the database
These documents will be published online and inform the public dialog over police technology. Because of the great public interest in these issues, I ask that you waive any fees. If your agency is unable to do so, please contact me with an estimate of the costs.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Dave Maass
Investigative Researcher
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Examples:
Mobile facial recognition
http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/nov/08/cir-facial-recognition-software-san-diego/
Mobile fingerprint readers
http://www.policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display_arch&article_id=1824&issue_id=62009
Mobile iris scanners
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/20/us-crime-identification-iris-idUSTRE76J4A120110720
Rapid DNA
http://www.policemag.com/channel/technology/articles/2014/02/speeding-up-dna-analysis.aspx
Mobile Tattoo Recognition
http://www.lawofficer.com/articles/print/volume-10/issue-4/features/new-smartphone-app-interprets.html
From: Fay, Sally
Dear Mr. Maas:
This acknowledges that the Indiana Integrated Public Safety Commission has received your e-mail below requesting certain public records. All public records properly disclosable under Indiana’s Access to Public Records Act, IC 5-14-3 et. seq., will be disclosed to you within a reasonable period of time.
Sincerely,
Sally Fay
Director of Communications & Training
Integrated Public Safety Commission
________________________________
Sally Fay | Integrated Public Safety Commission | Director of Communications & Training | Office: 317.234.2572 | Mobile: 317.439.7515| sfay@ipsc.in.gov<mailto:sfay@ipsc.in.gov>
[f_logo.png]<http://www.facebook.com/IN.COMMS> [twitter_follow.png] <https://twitter.com/IPSC_Indiana>
From: MuckRock.com
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on Aug. 17, 2015. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
From: Fay, Sally
RE: Public Records Request received by e-mail August 17, 2015
Dear Mr. Maas:
The Indiana Integrated Public Safety Commission (IPSC) is not a law enforcement agency. IPSC does not procure or deploy biometric technologies, mobile or otherwise. As to your request regarding IPSC and biometric technologies, IPSC responds as follows:
1) Purchasing and procurement documents, including but not limited to: purchase orders, RFPs, responses to RFPs, invoices and contracts. IPSC has no records responsive to this request.
2) Policy, procedural, and training documents, including but not limited to: use policies, standard operating procedures, training materials, presentations, privacy assessments, data retention policies, and other guidelines. IPSC has no records responsive to this request.
3) Programming documents, including but not limited to: funding opportunity announcements, grant applications and grantor status/progress reports, reports to legislative bodies, annual reports. IPSC has no records responsive to this request.
4) Audit documents, including but not limited to: audits of the system, misuse reports, and reports to oversight bodies. IPSC has no records responsive to this request.
Indiana Integrated Public Safety Commission, by
Sally Fay, Communications Director
-
~WRD000
From: Dave Maass
Ms. Fay,
Please conduct another search of your records. As I understand it, the commission has a role in the INGangNetwork, which in turn is connected with a tattoo recognition program:
http://www.in.gov/cji/files/DC_GARI-InterAct.pdf
Sincerely,
Dave Maass
From: MuckRock.com
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on Aug. 17, 2015. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
From: Fay, Sally
September 24, 2015
Dear Mr. Maass,
You have questioned the accuracy of IPSC’s response that it has no records responsive to your request in light of your understanding that IPSC “has a role in the INGangNetwork, which in turn is connected with a tattoo recognition program: http://www.in.gov/cji/files/DC_GARI-InterAct.pdf.”
As we stated in our initial response, “The Indiana Integrated Public Safety Commission (IPSC) is not a law enforcement agency. IPSC does not procure or deploy biometric technologies, mobile or otherwise.”
IPSC provides infrastructure (servers) and the software that facilitates the sharing of data among public safety agencies. The data on IPSC’s servers belongs to the public safety agency that houses it there.
To clarify in light of your follow-up email: INGangNetwork (“INGN”) data is not owned by IPSC, under the control of IPSC, or housed on its servers. IPSC has not participated in any procurements initiated by INGN, provides no funds for its support, and plays no role in the policies, procedures or training surrounding its use. IPSC’s system does, however, permit authorized users of its Computer Aided Dispatch / Records Management System (public safety officials) to utilize an InterAct mobile application to query various non-IPSC databases, one of which is the INGN database. If applicable, the InterAct mobile application will alert the user that INGN may have pertinent information. All follow-up queries are done outside of IPSC’s systems and directly through the INGN. IPSC’s system does not capture or retain query responses from the mobile application.
Accordingly, we still have no records responsive to your request. We trust this satisfies your follow-up query.
Sincerely,
~Sally Fay
Director of Communications & Outreach
Integrated Public Safety Commission
-
~WRD000