Branch County
County record. Includes every city and agency within Branch County.
Technology presence
What these categories mean
- ALPR
- Automated license plate readers (ALPR): camera systems that automatically capture, read, and log vehicle license plates with location and time, producing a searchable record of vehicle movements.
- Fixed cameras & RTCC
- Agency-operated fixed video cameras and the real-time crime centers (RTCC) that aggregate live and recorded feeds for monitoring. Extends the Electronic Frontier Foundation's Atlas, which enumerates real-time crime centers and camera registries but not standalone fixed-camera estates.
- Face recognition
- Software that matches faces in images or video against a reference database to identify or verify individuals.
- Drones / UAS
- Uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), commonly called drones, operated by an agency for overhead observation, imaging, or sensing.
- Gunshot detection
- Networks of acoustic sensors that detect and locate suspected gunfire and alert an agency.
- Body-worn & dashcam
- Officer body-worn and in-vehicle dashboard cameras that record encounters; public access to the footage is frequently restricted.
- Doorbell & camera registry
- Programs that give an agency access to privately owned camera footage: doorbell-camera partnerships, citizen camera registries, and private-camera integration platforms.
- Cell-site simulators
- Devices 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.
- Predictive policing
- Software that forecasts where crime may occur or who may be involved, to direct policing. Adjacent: analytics rather than a sensing deployment.
- Social-media monitoring
- Tools that collect and analyze public social-media activity for an agency. Adjacent: open-source/communications monitoring outside the visual/sensor core.
The record, by agency
Coldwater Police Department
The Coldwater Police Department installed four Flock Safety automated license plate readers in 2023.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Coldwater Daily Reporter
The Coldwater Police Department has desktop access to Michigan State Police's face recognition system, the Statewide Network of Agency Photos (SNAP).
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Michigan State PoliceMichigan State PoliceMichigan State Police
The Coldwater Police Department received $4,927 from the Bureau of Justice Assistance to purchase 8 body-worn cameras through the 2022 Small, Rural, Tribal BWC Microgrant program.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Small, Rural, and Tribal Body-Worn Camera microgrant grantee list
Branch County Sheriff's Office
The Branch County Sheriff's Office has desktop access to Michigan State Police's face recognition system, the Statewide Network of Agency Photos (SNAP).
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Michigan State PoliceMichigan State PoliceMichigan State Police
Quincy Police Department
The Quincy Police Department has desktop access to Michigan State Police's face recognition system, the Statewide Network of Agency Photos (SNAP).
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Michigan State PoliceMichigan State PoliceMichigan State Police
Union City Police Department
The Union City Police Department has desktop access to Michigan State Police's face recognition system, the Statewide Network of Agency Photos (SNAP).
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Michigan State PoliceMichigan State PoliceMichigan State Police
Source: EFF Atlas of Surveillance (Electronic Frontier Foundation & University of Nevada, Reno — Reynolds School of Journalism) · CC BY 4.0 · retrieved July 2026