Search A Light In The Darkness

Wednesday 5 October 2016

Spying street lights equipped with microphones, Wi-Fi detectors and more coming to a city near you

Soon, spying street lights equipped with ShotSpotter microphones will be in every city and town, that's because GE lighting and ShotSpotter (SST) are working together to spy on everyone.

Last year, GE and SST announced they're combining forces to put SST surveillance devices into street lights.

A memorandum of understanding between GE Lighting and SST, Inc., developer of the ShotSpotter crime detection and location suite, lays ground to embedding sophisticated SST technology into GE’s intelligent LED street lights.

“We’ve entered an era where lighting is so much more than illumination,” says Rick Freeman, Global Product General Manager, Intelligent Devices, GE Lighting. “The ecosystem we are building with our Intelligent Environments for Cities solution is transforming street lighting into the analytical brain of urban life, and this MOU with ShotSpotter gives one more option for cities to unlock new potential benefits for their city teams and their residents.”

We've entered an era where lighting is so much more than illumination? If they're talking about spying on an entire population, then I guess they're right. What are the potential benefits to residents? Fear and control are two things that come to mind, more on that below.

To learn how police use ‘ShotSpotter’ to spy on public conversations, click here.