Last August we got a chance to see the NYPD's $40 million "all-seeing" Domain Awareness System in action. The Matrix system, which combines arrest records, 911 calls, license plate readers and radiation detectors with the feeds from 3,000 or so surveillance cameras in Lower Manhattan and at bridge and tunnel openings, was developed by Microsoft especially for the NYPD, and has been in use for a year. Yesterday Mayor Bloomberg visited the folks manning the DAS at 55 Broadway to thank them for their service and remind us that the Founding Fathers would have installed surveillance cameras in their wigs if they had the chance. Take a look at these photos of the system while the system looks at photos of you.
Don't confuse the DAS with the NYPD's Real Time Crime Center, which uses GIS and billions of public records to track crime in, uh, real time. Eventually the components of the DAS will be available for use for the NYPD's 35,000 uniformed officers, at which point we'll all be living in a Much Safer Place.
