Motorola Solutions unveils end-to-end body-worn camera solution for public safety

Motorola Solutions today announced its end-to-end solution for body-worn cameras that features a combined video camera/radio speaker microphone in a single device and a data storage system with video management on Microsoft’s Azure Government cloud platform that complies with Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) standards.

Motorola has two body-worn devices in its digital-evidence management solution that combine an articulated video camera with a radio speaker microphone as part of the “Smart Interface” (Si) series of devices, according to Ron Toth, Motorola Solutions’ global product manager for the Si series device and a member of the shared-technology planning and operations team.

“Agencies told us over and over again that they really like the idea of having all of these different functionalities in a single device,” Toth said during an interview with IWCE’s Urgent Communications. “So, it makes the device easier for the officer to use and manage—it’s less for them to worry about. Consolidating audio and video into a single device really makes it a lot more simple solution for the officer.”

Toth said the Si devices feature a video camera that can record up to 1080p high-definition resolution, as well as a speaker mic that delivers audio quality and noise suppression that is equivalent to the company’s APC 6000 radio. The Si300 device does not have a display, while the Si500 has a 3.2-inch display that has a purpose that may be new to some public-safety personnel, he said.

“The device can actually be worn with the display facing out,” Toth said. “The unique attribute to that is that we support a feature called Video Preview that allows an officer to press a button on the side of the device that is programmable, and that will turn the camera on without recording anything.

“What we’ve found in trials with agencies around the globe is that, in some cases, [public-safety officers] are actually able to diffuse a situation by just having someone see themselves on a camera—that has a tendency to calm a person down without having to record any video at all.”

Of course, recording video is only half the challenge for public-safety agencies that deploy body-worn cameras; storing and managing all of the recorded video is the other key component. With that in mind, Motorola Solutions has introduced a cloud-based CommandCentral Vault application to address this need.

CommandCentral Vault utilizes the CJIS-compliant Microsoft Azure Government cloud platform to store video and a partnership with Adobe Systems to provide content-management tools and visual effects that will let public-safety agencies find the video it needs and implement privacy redactions—when appropriate—as quickly and efficiently as possible, according to Nathan Rowe, director of product management for intelligence-led public-safety solutions at Motorola Solutions.