The Community Safety Information Grid and Real-Time Crime Prevention Center

The last time I wrote on this blog was almost 2 years a go.. We had a vision we spoke about a concept, we took two years to make this concept a reality. And I am writing today to report and share with you our achievement. And what next.

Most important is the unique approach we are taking in developing technology--the unique relationship between the user and the technologist--as technologists we started thinking like the end user, we eat, sleep, think like the end user...we are committed to deliver technology that respond effectively to the operational requirements. In my career I saw so many projects starting with a white paper called requirements....never worked. When you start learning a language, you go over many stages, once you start dreaming in that language means you achieved your goal...same thing with technology development, when you start understanding end user's problem...you feel the same pain. you are ready to innovate and start thinking of a solution. I have never understood why some organizations keep great engineers in labs, and the sales people are in the street...fundamental mistake...

And our MOTO:

"Our objective is to think beyond new products. Our aim is to imagine, innovate and create products and services that have the power to profoundly change customers’ expectations"

A successful technology/product development need to start by a marriage: end user-developer...


I have been on the road, in the lab, the streets testing what probably is the most significant advance in smart image sensor technology. The City of East Orange and the vision we shared with Director Jose Corderro is a reality. People ask me when do you sleep...the answer I don't need to, I am too excited.. a good friend of mine recently wrote:

Tarik is very much like my late father: brilliant engineer from a backwoods area, speaks half a dozen languages, he has the metabolism of a mongoose, and he only needs a few hours sleep every night. He also has a wide circle of friends..... "HA HA HA...this is cool, and it i an honor to be compared to Peter Petroff, the adventurous inventor, an engineer at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and an inventor whose enterprises developed a heart monitor and the digital wristwatch 30 years ago.

What make me more excited and motivated is the relationship I have with my clients. Last week I spent 7 days at the East Orange Police Department almost 24 hours/day, police car takes be back to my hotel at 1am and comes back to pick me up at 5am.

We finalized: "The Community Safety Information
Grid and Real-Time Crime Prevention Center"
Where Smart Image Sensor Technology, Enhanced Police Information Platforms, and Systems Integration Paves the Way for Law Enforcement to Seize and Sustain a Marked Competitive Edge in the Fight Against Crime



People ask what is it? Lets get to the definition:

The primary mission of the Real-Time Crime Prevention Center (RT-CPC) is to prevent crime and to mitigate threats to public safety. RT-CPC personnel operate and monitor a chain of interconnected and networked digital, virtual, and image sensory devices which provide law enforcement with crime prevention superiority. The RT-CPC proactively collects, fuses, assesses, and converts raw information from multiple sources into actionable intelligence in real-time. Intelligence fusion is a revolutionary approach that dramatically improves the ability to defuse threats to public safety before they occur and to optimize resources for timely and effective surveillance or incident response. In addition, crime prevention and incident mitigation plans are electronically transmitted to police patrols, virtual patrollers, and image sensory agents to prevent, not just react to criminal activity. Moreover, police responses are electronically synchronized and assessed in real-time.

The following video posted on Youtub, shows the 4 parallel screens in the control room, and how in just one second we close the loop, Smart sensor operator-triggered automated emergency dispatch of closest available field units to emergency situations. Upon receipt of a verified smart sensor priority alarm, operators trigger an ABAD response. ABAD signals TAC AVL to identify patrol cars closest to the scene; TAC AVL electronically hands over the information to the computer-assisted dispatch (CAD) system which instantly transmits automated dispatch instructions, shaving critical seconds or minutes off police response times.



In summary what we achieved

1. Situation awareness every 30 seconds;

2. Transformation of disparate data sources into a common operating picture for proactive threat identification and prevention;

3. Discovery and exploration of hidden trends, patterns, and relationships among data and identification of the leading indicators of potential threats;

4. Sharing of processes as well as products for efficient collaboration and maximum reuse of intelligence;

5. Creation of cause-and-effect scenarios to determine best course of action, plan for contingencies, and to maximize resource allocation;

6. Streamlining work flow and maximizing time-to-discovery through automated extraction, routing, and processing of data; and

7. Deployment of system-wide policy parameters to control data access, interaction, and processing.

The exciting part is the police definition of our Smart imaging sensor technology:

Programmable high definition cameras embedded with a computer chip that intelligently analyzes images in real-time. Smart sensors are programmed to detect and warn of common and specific elements of street crime (threat profiles) specific to East Orange and help solve crime by providing video footage of completed or potential crimes. Smart sensors track individuals and objects of police interest (e.g. cars) from sensor to sensor and store object information, such as the characteristics of a vehicle used in a crime and detects its emergence at a future point in time. Smart sensors alert law enforcement to criminogenic elements or conditions that often result in serious criminal activity. Importantly, this allows the police to intervene and alter the dynamics of crime-producing situations before crime occurs. For example, drug dealing hotspots are notoriously correlated with incidences of violent--particularly firearm-related--crimes. Knowing exactly when and how these activities occur (based on actual threat profiles) allows the police to leverage scarce resources more precisely and meaningfully. The integration of smart sensors with conventional police surveillance cameras allows for the formulation of a virtual surveillance rings around incident locations. The system is integrated with CAD, LEED and TAC AVL to increase agency effectiveness and allow for a more proactive approach. Sensory incident alerts are based on local conditions as specified by local law enforcement, hence are easy for non-technical users to understand and modify as needed. Smart agent analytics can be quickly updated by police operators to recognize specific elements of new threat profiles as they evolve.

We had around 100 people visiting the centre, police department from around the US, the Brazilian federal police looking for solutions to the next soccer world cup and the olympics they are organizing in their country.

What next:
I have a great pleasure to announce that the City of Hoboken is installing our smart imaging devices (65 sensors), the city of North Bergen is following with 50 sensors and we are on target to deliver an advanced technology platform to the Department of transportation in Washington DC, and we will be from next week working with UNISYS as a suplier providing an advanced imaging sensor technology for vehicle classification and tracking for boarder protection.