Now, a growing number of police departments across the US want access to your video. It may sound like an Orwellian science fiction novel, but it’s true.
Surveillance Camera Registration And Mapping, or SCRAM as it’s called, is a program where police have residents ‘voluntarily’ register their home surveillance systems with the local police. The way the program is supposed to work, is when a crime is committed near your home, police can ‘request’ all the footage that your system recorded. Of course, if you don’t voluntarily give up the footage, police will either take it by force, or get a warrant to secure the footage.
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Take New Jersey, for example. Assemblyman Ralph Caputo crafted
bill A-3843permitting a municipality to enact an ordinance establishing a private outdoor video surveillance camera registry, requiring owners of such cameras to register them with police.
People who don’t do it would be subject to $100 fines. That bill is currently making it’s way through the state legislature (it currently has been amended to make the registration process voluntary, though if the registration will be voluntary, why is there a need to pass this bill?)
Registration data must include the owner’s name, address, telephone number, listing of all cameras used there, description of areas viewed by the cameras, and details about how and how long images are saved. New Jersey isn’t alone in their registry. The cities Fremont, San Mateo and Sacramento, California, all have ‘voluntary’ registries as well. Additionally, St. Petersburg, Florida, began their ‘voluntary’ registration last year.
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