Schenectady County
County record. Includes every city and agency within Schenectady 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
Schenectady Police Department
The Schenectady Police Department signed a $700,000 contract for Brinc drones in December 2023. The agency began operating a Drone as First Responder (DFR) program in June 2024.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Drone DJScripps News
The Schenectady Police Department received a grant for license plate readers.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Bureau of Justice Assistance, US Department of Justice
The U.S. Department of Justice awarded $165,000 to the Schenectady Police Department in 2017 as part of the Bureau of Justice Assistance's body-worn camera grant program.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): U.S Department of Justice
Schenectady County Sheriff's Office
The Schenectady County Sheriff's Office received $46,000 from the Bureau of Justice Assistance to purchase 23 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
The Schenectady County Sheriff's Office operates one drone as of 2019, according to data compiled by the Center for the Study of the Drone at Bard College.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Center for the Study of the Drone at Bard Collegedailygazette.com
The Schenectady County Sheriff's Office uses automated license plate readers.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): WHGB CBS 6
Niskayuna Town Police Department
The Niskayuna Town Police Department received $33,420 from the Bureau of Justice Assistance to purchase 30 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
Rotterdam Police Department
The Rotterdam Police Department purchased five Watchman automated license plate readers in 2019.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Traffic Technology Today
Source: EFF Atlas of Surveillance (Electronic Frontier Foundation & University of Nevada, Reno — Reynolds School of Journalism) · CC BY 4.0 · retrieved July 2026