The surveillance technology Ireland's public bodies operate
What An Garda Síochána and Ireland's local authorities operate — body-worn cameras, number-plate recognition (ANPR), drones, and CCTV schemes — with a citation behind every entry. By county; the oversight around each system is the next layer of the record. Part of a worldwide record that so far covers the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the Netherlands.
The observatory
Deployments on the public record, aggregated by county. Filter by technology; select a county for its full record. Garda-wide programmes are listed under the national force below.
Source: the public record — An Garda Síochána and Irish government publications and Data Protection Commission audit reports; per-entry citations on each record · retrieved July 2026
By county
Leinster
| County | Deployments |
|---|---|
| Kildare | 2 |
| Meath | 2 |
| Dublin | 1 |
| Wexford | 1 |
| Carlow | 0 |
| Kilkenny | 0 |
| Laois | 0 |
| Longford | 0 |
| Louth | 0 |
| Offaly | 0 |
| Westmeath | 0 |
| Wicklow | 0 |
Munster
Connacht
Ulster
National force
Garda-wide programmes apply across every county; they are recorded once here rather than per county.
| Operator | Deployments |
|---|---|
| An Garda Síochána | 4 |
The technologies in Ireland
Counts are Irish deployments on the public record; a zero means none on record, not necessarily none in operation.
ANPR
Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR): camera systems that automatically capture, read, and log vehicle number plates with location and time, producing a searchable record of vehicle movements.
7 on recordFixed cameras & RTCC
Agency-operated fixed video cameras and the real-time crime centers (RTCC) that aggregate live and recorded feeds for monitoring.
8 on recordFace recognition
Software that matches faces in images or video against a reference database to identify or verify individuals.
none on recordDrones / UAS
Uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), commonly called drones, operated by an agency for overhead observation, imaging, or sensing.
4 on recordGunshot detection
Networks of acoustic sensors that detect and locate suspected gunfire and alert an agency.
none on recordBody-worn & dashcam
Officer body-worn and in-vehicle dashboard cameras that record encounters; public access to the footage is frequently restricted.
3 on recordDoorbell & camera registry
Programs that give an agency access to privately owned camera footage: doorbell-camera partnerships, citizen camera registries, and private-camera integration platforms.
none on recordCell-site simulators
adjacentDevices that mimic cell towers to locate or identify nearby mobile phones. They are often called Stingrays, or IMSI catchers after the international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) number that identifies each phone on a network. Adjacent: communications surveillance outside the visual/sensor core.
none on recordPredictive policing
adjacentSoftware that forecasts where crime may occur or who may be involved, to direct policing. Adjacent: analytics rather than a sensing deployment.
none on recordSocial-media monitoring
adjacentTools that collect and analyze public social-media activity for an agency. Adjacent: open-source/communications monitoring outside the visual/sensor core.
none on recordFacial recognition: none in operation
An Garda Síochána does not currently use facial recognition, so the record carries no deployment rows for it. The Garda Síochána (Recording Devices) (Amendment) Bill 2025 passed both Houses of the Oireachtas on 23 June 2026 but has not yet been enacted; its scope is limited to retrospective biometric analysis of already-recorded footage — live facial recognition is reserved for possible future legislation. This section will become deployment rows if and when use begins on the record.
News coverage
Recent coverage naming an Irish county or An Garda Síochána (the national police).
About this record
Ireland's deployment data is compiled from the public record: An Garda Síochána's own publications under the Garda Síochána (Recording Devices) Act 2023 — body-worn cameras, ANPR, and related systems — Oireachtas and government publications, and the Data Protection Commission's published audits of local-authority surveillance. Each entry keeps its citation. The oversight around each system is the record's next layer, built from requests under Ireland's Freedom of Information Act 2014; see the Ireland records-law analysis. Until a body's records arrive, its oversight status reads not yet requested. Full notes on the methodology page.