Niagara County
County record. Includes every city and agency within Niagara 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
Lewiston Police Department
The Lewiston Police Department has eight Flock Safety automated license plate readers.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Government TechnologyNiagara Frontier Publications
The Lewiston Police Department received a state grant to pay for license-plate readers, cameras into patrol cars, a drone, a surveillance tower and other equipment.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Niagara Frontier Publications
Lewiston Police Department launched a 5-year body-worn camera program in 2017.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): The Lewiston TribuneLewiston City Council AgendaKLEW
Niagara Falls Police Department
The Niagara Falls Police Department has two dozen Flock automated license plate readers. The purchase cost $12,100 for 24 solar-powered ALPRs and $288,000 for cloud-based software, storage, support and maintenance.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Government Tech
Niagara County Probation Department
The Niagara County Probation Department received a Small, Rural and Tribal Body-Worn Camera Program grant for $3,397 for 20 body-worn cameras in 2023.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Justice & Security StrategiesJustice & Security Strategies
Niagara County Sheriff's Office
The Niagara County Sheriff's Office installing 67 Flock Safety automated license plate readers in 2023.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): WGRZ
The Niagara County Sheriff's Office has three drones, according to a 2022 report from the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): ACLU of New YorkCenter for the Study of the Drone at Bard Collegeregistry.faa.gov
Lockport Police Department
The Lockport Police department had 64 body-worn cameras as of July 2022.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Yahoo News
Niagara Police Department
The Niagara Police Department has one drone, according to a 2022 report from the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): ACLU of New York
Lockport City School District
The Lockport City School District spent $1.4 million to install the Aegis face recognition system on 300 cameras, which went live in January 2019.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): NY Times
Niagra Falls Police Department
In 2018, the New York Attorney General provided $51,791 to the Niagara Falls Police Department for 64 body-worn cameras and 9 body-worn camera docking stations.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): New York Attorney General's Office
Niagara Intelligence and Crime Analysis Center
The Niagara Intelligence and Crime Analysis Center is part of a network of 10 real-time crime analysis centers supported by the New York State Division of Criminal Justice. The NICAC was founded in 2016 and is housed at the Niagara Police Department. According to a press release, the NICAC "features a 12-foot by 6½-foot video wall that displays multiple sources of information, including a computer aided dispatch log and video from public surveillance cameras."
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): New York State Division of Criminal Justice ServicesNew York Governor's OfficeThe Buffalo News
Source: EFF Atlas of Surveillance (Electronic Frontier Foundation & University of Nevada, Reno — Reynolds School of Journalism) · CC BY 4.0 · retrieved July 2026