City of Providence
Providence County · Rhode Island
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.
- Fusion & investigative platforms
- Third-party platforms that fuse data across sources, sometimes including other surveillance feeds, for law-enforcement search and analysis, sold or licensed to multiple agencies rather than built by any one of them: examples include Palantir, Peregrine Systems, C3.ai, and SoundThinking's CrimeTracer (formerly Coplink X). Adjacent: an analytics layer that sits above the surveillance feeds this site otherwise tracks, rather than a sensing deployment of its own.
The record, by agency
Drafted with AI
Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page. How this site is made
Providence Police Department
The Providence Police Department has a Real Time Crime Center that includes Fusus, Flock Safety and Accurint technologies.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): Providence Eye
The Providence Police Department reported conducting 226 searches using Skopenow's investigastive platform.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): 2023 Providence Police Annual Report
The Providence Police Department reported conducting 625 searches using Lexis Nexis's Accurint investigative platform.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): 2023 Providence Police Annual Report
60 cameras measured on the agency's Flock Safety transparency portal, via UnGovr, as of August 2026.
As of April 2024, the Providence Police Department operates 25 Flock Safety automated license plate readers. The agency stores ALPR data for 30 days.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): The News & ObserverThe News & Observer
The Providence Police Department purchased 250 Axon body-worn cameras in 2016. In 2022. PPD received a $2.3 million grant for 270 BWCs.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): WPRI 12 NewsProvidence Business NewsProvidence Business News
The Providence Police Department maintains a voluntary registry of private and personal surveillance cameras.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): City of Providence
Rhode Island College Police Department
As of April 2024, the Rhode Island College Police Department operates three Flock Safety automated license plate readers. The agency stores ALPR data for 30 days.
Sources (via the EFF Atlas): The News & ObserverThe News & Observer
Sources: Flock Safety transparency portals · EFF Atlas of Surveillance