Rising number of CCTV cameras in schools

We will always give credit where credit is due on Big Brother Watch; so massive credit to Dr Emmeline Taylor from the University of Salford, who has conducted a fascinating survey into the number of schools installing CCTV systems.

Dr Taylor surveyed 24 comprehensives in the north west of England and discovered that 23 had installed more than 20 cameras.

As reported by the Daily Telegraph:

As many as 85 per cent of teachers have reported the use of CCTV in their schools and one-in-10 said cameras had even been placed in toilets.

According to the study, some schools are also using other techniques such as fingerprinting, metal detectors, electronic identity cards, eye scanners and facial recognition systems.

Research funded by Salford University said that schools were increasingly becoming a “hotbed for surveillance practices” in the UK as children were subjected to checks for often mundane reasons such as borrowing a book from a library or paying for lunch.

But Dr Emmeline Taylor also suggested many schools were collecting CCTV images illegally by failing to inform pupils and visitors that they were being monitored under the Data Protection Act.

Placed alongside Big Brother Watch's report from last December into council-controlled CCTV cameras - it is clear that the UK is witnessing a massive expansion in surveillance technology.

As Alex wrote last week when discussing the latest case of cameras being placed in school toilets: "Schools are immunising their pupils to surveillance. First they say the cameras aren’t switched on, then they say they’re only pointing at the sinks – pupils and parents get used to the presence of the technology and by the time the cameras are capturing intimate moments, nobody will complain."

Dr Taylor's survey is fascinating - not only for the data or the fact that schools are collecting images without informing pupils, teachers and parents - but also because she has found no evidence that the rise in cameras is providing schools with a solution to the problems (crime, bullying, smoking, truancy) the CCTV was supposed to fix. Her own conclusion perhaps sums it up best:

“The effectiveness of CCTV in preventing and detecting crime remains extremely dubious, and its impact upon more trivial behaviours such as playing truant has not been measured.

“CCTV is often attributed with numerous benefits that often there is no evidence to suggest that it can deliver on.”

By Dylan Sharpe

Comments

[Reason]

CCTV, fingerprinting, metal detectors, electronic identity cards, eye scanners and facial recognition systems.

Yes, young people are being "groomed". So that when they reach adulthood, surveillance is the norm. Go into Tesco, see the "Are You Under 25" signs (when the legal age is actually 18). The state authorities are just like paedophiles - grooming the young so they are compliant and malleable in the future.

[FedUp]

Surveillance cameras are there to promote feelings of fear not safety. The fear of being caught doing something, anything.
To make you fear that something might happen rather than to catch things that do happen. Enabling fear to be the driving force behind policy and law making

[LeChiffre]

@ Reason & FedUp

I quite agree with you both.

[NeverSurrender]

We need a concerted campaign to free us from this vile surveillance by CCTV.

The law must be changed to make it illegal to photograph or video people without their consent. Exceptions could be where a time limited warrant has been granted by a judge or, to catch a crime in progress. When people are incidentally captured in private photography and filming that can also be ignored.

This Orwellian government has destroyed our freedom but we only have ourselves to blame for letting it happen. We should have been rioting in the streets years ago to stop it. It will take millions of protestors to end the surveillance now. Unless that happens it will only continue to get worse. :-(

[Purlieu]

start a petition at number10 and also a FB group - get viral with it

[Gordon Brown]

We will do whatever it takes to make you more secure...It is after all the right thing to do.

[zorro]

Bless our dear Gordon (sorry). He also wants you to have identity cards so that you don't forget who you are.......It shouldn't be illegal to film people overtly. If you do that the old bill will be all over you like a ton of bricks if you catch them in flagrante delito and we do need to keep the police to account. They are not to be trusted in that situation unfortunately especially when they arrest you after you've been defending yourself from attacks by truculent youths

[NeverSurrender]

Zorro - I didn't say anything about filming overtly. I meant all filming whether overtly or otherwise. All the CCTV cameras everywhere whether public or private need to come down unless we have freely consented to their use.

Obviously I only could mention a couple of exceptions but I certainly agree with you that filming the police should be allowed in order to hold them accountable for their actions.

[NeverSurrender]

Zorro - Sorry, my head suffered a little meltdown and read covert instead of overt in your post.

[Wireless Video Camera]

I wonder who monitors and analyses the footage, with what qualifications and how many members of staff are required to monitor footage on a daily basis of a large comprehensive? What costs would that incur?

[Miles Brindley]

Just accept it CCTV surveillance is here to stay. You can't stop progress and you can't halt technology.
Anything authorities can utilise to cut costs on security personal will always be popular.

[amber]

get rid of all cameras its harder to smoke at school!!

[Cash gifting]

CCTV should be used for the benefit of the people not to mentally torture the people. Nobody, no office or organisation has the right to video someone without consent, it would be invasion of privacy.