LA Cops get Wi-Fi Drive By Access

An anonymous reader writes " A PC World.com article: "the Los Angeles Police Department plans to install 27 wireless local area networks (WLANs) at police stations throughout the city in the next three months, according to Roger Ham, deputy chief for communications at the LAPD. Ham says he plans to equip police cars with handheld computers from Symbol Technologies. The handheld devices will be equipped with 802.11b WLAN cards that communicate in the unlicensed 2.4-GHz band with access points installed in police stations at a raw data rate of 11 megabits per second-far faster than the 19.2-kilobits-per-second throughput in the department's 800-MHz wide area network (WAN) installed by Motorola two years ago and covering the city. Will Strauss, an analyst at Forward Concepts, called Ham's plan "a cheap way to get bandwidth" that would allow LAPD units to periodically pick up high-bandwidth data as they pass by police stations equipped with WLAN systems."

Comments

probably require s

[stonebeat.org]

VPN tunnel, and 2-factor authentication (RSA secureID), to get connected. otherwise it would be very unsecure.

Re:probably require s

[pi_rules]

I'm seeing way too many of these posts. It's a non-issue folks. If you read the article (I skimmed it) you'll see they see it being used for:

• Sending mug-shots over the air.
  
• Sending maps.
  
• Sending Amber Alert pictures.
  

They need it for -- pictures. None of which are sensitive information. Mug shots can be obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, Amber Alert pictures are intended to be public, and last I knew maps of your local town weren't a closely guarded government secret.

Besides, do you really want police having information that's too secret for you? I sure don't.

Re:Wouldn't jamming ...

[cadillactux]

This is possible, but remember, each car will still be equiped with the 800Mhz 19.2k Motorola systems. If for some reason, WiFi was jammed, they could just switch back to the old system. I wonder if the WiFi system will be integrated in such a way where this will be an automatic function? Even with 27 stations throughout the city, the gaps between the WiFi signals will be great, and it would be a pain to have to manually switch it on and off when you think you might have a signal.

It's a transport medium. Security is not it's job.

[mindstrm]

Seriously. WEP isn't even real security.. if you need security, you use it at another layer.....

Just because they are using 802.11b doesn't mean they aren't using anything else. They also haven't said what network protocol, or what mode 802.11b will be in, or what software they will use to do it... do you want all that too?

Re:802.11b now ... but 802.11g in the future

[Cef]

They could upgrade the Access Points, yes. For the LAPD however, if I was running the show, I'd be waiting till 802.11g is a proven technology, and that Symbol could produce decent equipment around the 802.11g standard.

Other things of note:
Symbol Technologies have not released an 802.11g capable device (Hand Held or Access Point) yet. The Symbol devices are very rugged, and they need a very long battery life if they are to be used in the field for any length of duration. Changing anything, including the radio card, could increase the drain on the battery. It's no use if you can get things 3-4 times faster if your battery only lasts 1/8th the time.
Wideband WAN stuff will require special cards in the units, which once again will be a battery drain. An alternative option of course is to have Wideband from the patrol car to the network, while still using 802.11b/g from the patrol car to the Hand Held unit. A number of logistic companies use this sort of system (using systems capable of mobile data, such as GSM and GPRS), though many connect the device serially in the vehicle instead of via RF.

Re:802.11b now ... but 802.11g in the future

[(54)T-Dub]

Car charger??