Economic Development, Technology & City Light Committee 2/8/23

You can begin now.

Good morning, everyone.

Today is February 8th, and the Economic Development Technology and City Light Committee will now come to order.

It is 9.37.

Let's see, Council Member Strauss has asked to be excused today, but I understand that central staff has briefed him on the items on today's agenda.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council President Juarez.

Here.

Council Member Herboldt.

Here.

Chair Nelson.

Present.

Council Member Sawant has requested to be excused.

So there are three present, two excused.

Thank you very much.

Okay folks today there are six council bills on the agenda for discussion, which would approve the surveillance impact reports on surveillance technologies, already in use by SPD when the 2017 surveillance ordinance took effect.

otherwise known as retroactive.

These SIRs are from Group 4B, and the specific technologies are camera systems for images or non-auditory video recordings, vehicle crash data retrieval tools, computer, cell phone, and mobile device data extraction tools, geotime software, remotely operated vehicles, not including aerial drones, and tracking devices.

Again, today is for briefing and discussion only, and the plan is to vote them out of committee at our next meeting on February 22nd.

Are there any objections to the agenda?

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Before proceeding to public comment, I want to expand a bit on my remarks during Monday's council briefings about my trip to Christchurch, New Zealand, last week representing the city of Seattle on a Sister City delegation.

Now for background, because I didn't know this, Sister Cities grew out of President Eisenhower's People to People initiative to further international peace by forging relationships and friendships between local governments and among people.

And it was established on September 11th, 1956. Seattle has 20 sister cities and the Seattle Christ Church program is one of the city's strongest and was founded over 40 years ago.

It's administered by OIR Director of International Relations, Stacey Jalik.

On Monday, I mentioned the fact that Seattle and Christ Church have benefited over the years from the exchange of mutual aid and lessons learned from recent earthquakes because we both occupy subduction zones.

And that was a major topic of conversation between me and the mayor.

Because Christchurch is still on going through planning and rebuilding after their 2011 earthquake that destroyed about 70% of the buildings in the in the city center.

And I also in by destroyed, I mean, damaged significantly, many are still standing in, but they're under renovation, or they are that are yet to be demolished.

I also touched on meetings that Tim Ranen, OIR's Director of Tribal Relations, and I had with several Ngāi Tahu leaders, which is the corporate entity of almost all of New Zealand's 18 Māori sub-tribes on the South Island.

So to continue what I wanted to get at, on the first day of my trip, before the delegations official activities began in addition to meeting with Mayor Phil Mauger and Councilor Yanni Johansson.

And by the way, he is one of 16 councilors.

The Christchurch City Council is made up of 16 council members and also the mayor sits in on all the meetings.

So it's referred to as an entity as city council.

Anyway, they're all elected by ward.

Anyway, in addition to those meetings, I also met with Ali Adams, chief executive of Christchurch, New Zealand City, the city's economic development agency funded primarily by the city, but outside of the city structure and Martin could the general manager for innovation in business growth.

And the agency's work is divided among, primarily among industry sectors.

And so, of course, because of my interest in film, I asked to meet with the head of Screen Canterbury, which is the regional division of the New Zealand Film Commission, which has, of course, secured some of the country's largest film projects.

Of course, The Lord of the Rings was filmed there.

So that was a really interesting discussion to see how the city supports the film industry there.

And I also met with the head of the Christchurch, Antarctica office, which has a long standing relationship that's formal relationship with joint base Lewis McCord formally.

McCord Air Force Base.

Why?

Well, because Christchurch is one of the world's five gateway cities to the Antarctic and McCord flies US and New Zealand scientists and supplies every season.

on their C-117s.

And the Polar Star icebreaker also stops in Christchurch when it travels to Antarctica.

So in addition to scientific research, a total of 75 businesses generate about $300 million dollars in revenue each year for the country and so I'm just mentioning this because this partnership is crucial not only for New Zealand but also for the US.

The delegation got to attend a portion of a city council meeting which was live streamed on their version of the Seattle Channel and this is fairly new.

The counselor I mentioned before, Yanni Johansson, traveled to the U.S. on a delegation years ago and noticed that we film and archive our council meetings, which wasn't done in Christchurch.

And so he brought back this idea, made it happen.

And this is just one demonstration of the benefit, mutual benefit of these sister city relationships.

Other highlights of the trip included trips to the Botanic Garden and other city parks to learn about New Zealand and Christchurch, and specifically its efforts to promote biodiversity and climate protection, for which, of course, New Zealand is recognized as a global leader.

And so I'll close by noting again that in Christchurch, almost 100% of the 2,500 City Hall employees, including the electeds and their staff, have returned to work full time.

And in the office and 85% of workers in the central business district have also returned to office full time.

And obviously here in Seattle we're, we're a bit behind resuming in office work but on Monday mayor, the mayor and King County executive announced the lifting of coven 19 vaccination mandate for city and county employees.

the state, county, and city ending the COVID state of emergency on October 31st.

And then last week, the legislative department's new two-day in-office work requirement was announced, and that will start on February 15th, I believe.

Thank you, President Juarez.

So I mentioned before that if I had my way, all council meetings would be here in person, because I believe this is good for improved public and press access to the democratic process of council meetings.

But I do believe that we're going in the right direction toward our economic and civic recovery.

And to quote, there are people here in the audience today, and they will be presenting, but if you've looked around City Hall, I want to quote from the signs that you can find all around that say, this city of Seattle facility is safe, ready, and welcome to you.

So come on back in two weeks.

In any case, with that, we'll now move to public comment on items listed on the agenda.

Would you please run the video?

It's coming, folks.

Hello Seattle.

We are the.

Emerald City, the city of flowers and the city of goodwill, built on indigenous land, the traditional territory of the Coast Salish peoples.

The Seattle City Council welcomes remote public comment and is eager to hear from residents of our city.

If you would like to be a speaker and provide a verbal public comment, you may register two hours prior to the meeting via the Seattle City Council website.

Here's some information about the public comment proceedings.

Speakers are called upon in the order in which they registered on the council's website.

Each speaker must call in from the phone number provided when they registered online and used the meeting ID and passcode that was emailed upon confirmation.

If you did not receive an email confirmation, please check your spam or junk mail folders.

A reminder, the speaker meeting ID is different from the general listen line meeting ID provided on the agenda.

Once a speaker's name is called, the speaker's microphone will be unmuted and an automatic prompt will say, the host would like you to unmute your microphone.

That is your cue that it's your turn to speak.

At that time, you must press star six.

You will then hear a prompt of, you are unmuted.

Be sure your phone is unmuted on your end so that you will be heard.

As a speaker, you should begin by stating your name and the item that you are addressing.

A chime will sound when 10 seconds are left in your allotted time as a gentle reminder to wrap up your public comments.

At the end of the allotted time, your microphone will be muted and the next speaker registered will be called.

Once speakers have completed providing public comment, please disconnect from the public comment line and join us by following the meeting via Seattle Channel broadcast or through the listening line option listed on the agenda.

The council reserves the right to eliminate public comment if the system is being abused or if the process impedes the council's ability to conduct its business on behalf of residents of the city.

Any offensive language that is disruptive to these proceedings or that is not focused on an appropriate topic as specified in Council rules may lead to the speaker being muted by the presiding officer.

Our hope is to provide an opportunity for productive discussions that will assist our orderly consideration of issues before the Council.

The public comment period is now open.

and we will begin with the first speaker on the list.

Please remember to press star six after you hear the prompt of, you have been unmuted.

Thank you, Seattle.

Okay, so we have no in-person commenters signed up, so we'll go straight to remote speakers, and everyone will have two minutes to speak, and we'll start with Emma Weil, Weil.

Please correct my mispronunciation.

Thank you.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

Thank you for allowing me to testify today on item D3.

My name is Emma Weil, and I am a senior policy analyst at Upturn, a nonprofit organization in Washington, D.C.

that works to advance justice and use of technology.

I'm here to testify about Seattle Police's use of mobile device forensics tools, or MDFTs, based on our report, Mass Extraction, which is the most comprehensive report of how police use MDFTs.

These tools allow police to search your cell phone for years worth of texts photos location data online search history and more.

Crucially at no point in human history have we casually stored so much information about ourselves in one place making MDFTs a significant expansion of law enforcement power.

Given this we believe the council should at minimum move to ban police consent searches of cell phones in Seattle if not all consent searches outright.

We found that police commonly rely on people's consent to search cell phones instead of getting a warrant.

This means there is no judicial oversight or legal limitations on the scope of the search or limits on how the data is later used.

Between 2018 and 2019 nearly one third of phones the Seattle Police Department searched were obtained through consent and not having a warrant.

But consent searches are legal fiction.

The Supreme Court has held that consent is illegitimate if it is coerced by explicit or implicit means.

But the notion that someone can actually free feel free to walk away from interaction ignores reality especially for people of color who face increased threat of potentially deadly police violence.

Recent data from California's Racial and Identity Profiling Advisory Board shows that 95% of individuals consent to a search when asked by an officer.

Additionally, there is almost never informed consent in the context of cell phone searches.

People may know that there is sensitive information on their phones, but it is impossible to mentally keep track of every record on one's phone.

Further, MDFTs can extract and analyze data that someone does not even know about, like metadata, meaning people cannot fully know what they're consenting to.

Banning consent searches is not a perfect solution, as it's easy for law enforcement to obtain a search warrant.

But banning consent searches of cell phones can help limit police discretion, limit the coercive power of police, and begin to rein in SPD's use of MVTs.

Accordingly, the council should, at minimum, ban the use of consent searches of cell phones, if not all consent searches outright.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Our next speaker is Cynthia Spies.

Hi, I'm Cynthia speeds and independent security researcher and district six resident my comments regarding all six surveillance technologies.

I set written public comments via email, which was recommendations that have not yet been addressed by either the existing surveillance impact reports or the CTOs letter.

Please recall that the city intentionally ordered the groups of retroactive surveillance technology reviews, such as the later groups were incrementally more concerning complex otherwise difficult.

This is the last large group and these would therefore be the most in need of your scrutiny and oversight by amendments.

Many of these technologies are highly privacy invasive.

Do you time computer cell phone a mobile device extraction tools covert cameras and location trackers should all be limited only to cases that are of a violent or serious offense.

Their use should be proportional to the crime across the board there needs to be a requirement for legal representation for all the consent based use of any of these tools and a ban on both predictive policing and biometric tools such as face gate or voice analysis.

using these systems or their data.

Additionally, SPD is using at least one tool that is from a company, Celebrate, which is linked to human rights abuses in multiple authoritarian countries.

These require the divestment from Celebrate.

More protections are needed for victims of domestic violence, which could be perpetrated by an SPD employee.

Please explicitly add a provision that the use of these technologies, except pursuant to that defined in the final SIR, exposes the individual to criminal or civil liability.

Stop the militarization and weaponization of SPD by prohibiting mounting of weapons to any ROV with the intent to harm or kill a living being and divest from buying ROVs from companies that are military manufacturers or defense contractors.

Many of the public's questions on the covert cameras location trackers ROVs and crash data retrieval tools are unanswered because Seattle IT didn't accept questions during the second public engagement meeting.

This is a disservice to the public and highlights that the city cares more about appearances and keeping the status quo instead of actually listening and collaborating with residents.

I urge council members to review the emails I sent, which have more details.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

And our last speaker that signed up is Jennifer Lee.

Good morning, Chair Nelson and members of the committee.

My name is Jennifer Lee, and I am the tech policy lead at the ACLU of Washington.

I'm also co-chair of the Community Surveillance Working Group.

I'm commenting on the six SPD surveillance technologies under review.

We appreciate the consideration of the working group's recommendations but believe that the council bills for each technology need to be updated to fully reflect those recommendations and address serious privacy and equity concerns.

For example the ACLU of Washington is concerned about the use of computer cell phone and mobile device extraction tools by SPD to surveil and ultimately chill constitutionally protected First Amendment activities concerning religion expression and assembly.

We recommend a prohibition on the use of consent searches with these extraction tools as consent searches create an inherent power imbalance and information asymmetry between law enforcement and members of the public.

Consent agreements also generally do not define adequate parameters limiting the phone search so police have ample discretion about what data they extract with these tools the scope of data they extract and what they do with that data.

We know that SPD heavily relies on consent agreements to deploy MDFTs.

Any consent process is unlikely to adequately fix the information deficit especially in the absence of legal counsel.

Additionally for all of these technologies there needs to be a prohibition on the use of these tools with biometric technologies for predictive policing and for dragnet social media analysis.

We are concerned that the appendices in each council budget do not adequately address the working group's recommendations.

In many of these appendices there are claims that the SIR addresses the working group's recommendations, but in many cases, the SIR actually falls short.

Lastly, there are many outstanding questions on undercover cameras, tracking devices, remotely operated vehicles, and crash data.

We have submitted detailed written comments with recommendations on each of the technologies, and we ask that you adopt all of these recommendations in order to mitigate privacy and civil liberties concerns.

Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you very much.

And that was our last speaker.

So the public comment period is now closed.

And since there are six items on the agenda of basically the same nature, and we have a panel of presenters and a presentation from Seattle IT that addresses all of them at once, I'm going to ask the clerk to read items one through six into the record right now.

Agenda Item 1, Council Bill 120499, an ordinance relating to surveillance technology implementation, authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2022 surveillance impact report and 2022 executive overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of camera systems, images, or non-auditory video recordings.

Agenda Item Number 2, Council Bill 120500, an ordinance relating to the surveillance technology implementation, authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2022 Surveillance Impact Report and 2022 Executive Overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of crash data retrieval tools.

agenda item three, council bill 120501, an ordinance relating to surveillance technology implementation, authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2022 surveillance impact report and 2022 executive overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of computer, cell phone, and mobile device extraction tools.

Agenda Item Number 4, Council Bill 120502, an ordinance relating to surveillance technology implementation, authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2022 surveillance impact report and 2022 executive overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of GeoTime.

agenda item number five, council bill 120503, an ordinance relating to surveillance technology implementation, authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2022 surveillance impact report and 2022 executive overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of remotely operated vehicles.

Agenda Item 6, Council Bill 120504, an ordinance relating to surveillance technology implementation, authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2022 surveillance impact report and 2022 executive overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of tracking devices.

All six agenda items are up for briefing and discussion.

Thank you, Stephen.

Okay, so this is how we're going to do this.

Seattle IT will give one presentation on the SIR review process, and then again, Captain Britt will answer, will present each technology and its uses, and council members will have the opportunity to ask questions about each one.

And Lisa Kay of Central Staff is here, and she's also available to answer questions, and her memo is attached to the to the agenda.

So will the presenters please come to the table and for everyone online and present, introduce yourselves, please, and then you may begin.

I guess I'll go ahead.

Good morning, everyone.

Thank you for the option to be here.

I'm Captain Jim Britt with the Seattle Police Department.

Director.

Jim Loader, Interim Chief Technology Officer for the City of Seattle.

Sarah Carrier, Privacy Program Manager, City of Seattle.

And do we have...

Lisa, would you like to introduce yourself?

Yes, thank you.

Sorry about that.

Lisa Kay, Central Staff.

Okay, let's begin now.

Go ahead and turn it over to you.

Okay.

And may I, if you don't mind, it is easier for the audience to hear.

These microphones aren't very sharp.

So if you're allowed to speak without your mask on.

Okay.

All right.

So we'll start with the next slide, please.

Thank you.

So first we'll walk you through a little bit of what the surveillance compliance process is, starting with an overview of the definition of surveillance and why we're looking at these technologies today.

So the definition of surveillance is a technology whose primary purpose is to observe, analyze the movements or behaviors or actions of identifiable individuals in a manner that is reasonably likely to raise concerns about civil liberty, freedom of speech or association, racial equity, or social justice.

There are a series of inclusion and exclusion criteria that are outlined in the ordinance that we used to evaluate what technologies should go through this review process.

Exclusions include technologies such as security cameras, police-borne body cameras, and infrastructure protection cameras.

Inclusion criteria, you can see on the right-hand side, any personal information shared with non-city entities, where the data will be used for purpose other than providing city with contractually agreed upon service, and things like technologies that raise reasonable concerns about civil liberties impacts.

Next slide, please.

So the process for the development of the surveillance impact reports is roughly outlined in approximately seven steps.

This is the development of the reports that have been submitted include these seven sections for each of the technologies going through this process.

The first is a privacy impact assessment, which outlines protections, data management practices, and applicable associated policies that help govern the technologies.

We have the financial information section, an adaptation of the racial equity toolkit.

public engagement comments and analysis, the privacy and civil liberties impact assessment that is drafted by the surveillance working group, the CTO response to that impact assessment by the working group, and then appendices and supporting documentation.

Next, please.

Okay, so overall the timeline for these retroactive technologies has historically been approximately eight to nine months.

and that includes the initial drafting of the surveillance impact report, which is an extensive research project.

Then after the report is drafted, it goes to public comment.

The public comment is added to the surveillance impact report and then provided to the Surveillance Advisory Working Group for the development of their Privacy and Civil Liberties Impact Assessment.

That is then incorporated into the SIR, and the CTO has an opportunity to respond to the concerns outlined in the assessment of the working group.

An executive overview is drafted of the surveillance impact report, and then finally we get to council submission, which is where we are now.

All right, so we've been in this process, I believe, since 2017, and we've gotten 18 of the retroactive technologies that are on the master list through this process, through the council process, and those are listed here.

We've grouped them accordingly just for efficiency's sake, essentially.

So now we're here to address some of the six that will be on the next slide, which are all SPD technologies.

Again, camera systems, computer, cell phone, mobile device extraction tools, crash data retrieval tools, geotime, ROVs, and tracking devices.

So a little bit more about the 4B public engagement process and the result.

So there were two public meetings held during the public comment period for this group of surveillance technologies, which also included, you know, you can see their one-page flyers.

that were translated into the seven tier one languages.

The recordings were posted online after the meeting, so those were made publicly accessible.

The two meetings for this group were held on April 27th and May 18th of 2022. You can see some of the numbers that resulted from all of the comment period.

Some of the letters submitted, questions, online comments, participants, number of participants at the public meeting, which does not include city staff.

and the number of questions received through all of those mediums.

So we had 12 participants in total for both of the public meetings.

We had 12 comments, and for the purposes of consistency, we counted those letters from organizations such as the ACLU as one letter.

So that's where that 12 comes from.

And then a myriad of questions that were both from the public meeting and present in online comments or emails submitted as public comment and in the letters received on these technologies.

And next slide, please.

All right, I will hand it over to Captain Britt.

Hold on, I have a question about this, and I'll ask if my colleagues do as well.

Can you go back to slide five, please?

Okay, so this is the general timeline, and it says eight to nine months, but you also said that This has been in process since the 2017 went into effect, so I'm assuming sometime in 2018 or whenever, but.

So question is, is that a an aspirational 8 to 9 months once this whole batch is finished?

The eight to nine months is kind of gauged from per grouping, right?

So we started with group one, group two, group three.

And so for each of those groups, we would approximate eight to nine months if everything goes consistently throughout the process.

Okay.

So yeah.

Got it.

Thank you.

All right.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

A couple of questions.

In public testimony, A member of the public said that we have moved through these groups of retroactive technologies in order of complexity and suggested that this particular group of technology is the, consequently, if that is true, that this is the most complex of the technologies that we have approved thus far, I'm interested to know whether or not that is the case.

And I'm wondering also as it relates to the process piece of this effort, is there, I understand that there are recommendations of the working group.

Some of those make it in, some of them don't, but is there a document that Seattle IT compiles that explains the reasons for not including some of the recommendations that aren't included in the recommendation to the council.

If that exists, I would love to have the opportunity to review it to understand better why many of what we're hearing as recommendations are not included so that we can understand the thinking of the city team on this.

Thank you.

Yeah, so the recommendations that came from the working group can be found in the package, in the SIR itself, within their Privacy and Civil Liberties Impact Assessment.

I would have to defer to SPD.

to evaluate how they would potentially operationalize those as that's more of a business decision than an IT decision.

So right now this reflects, right now this, oh, sorry.

My question is whether or not there's a document that explains the things that aren't included that were recommended.

I understand that we have the recommendations from the working group, and I understand we have the executive's recommendations to the council, what I'm asking is, is there sort of a crosswalk, a written explanation for why certain things that were recommended weren't included?

If I may, Councilmember Herbold, the table, the attachment in each of central staff's memo does provide a bit of that crosswalk and it does mention that it groups some of the recommendations under certain categories.

that have been addressed in the SIR.

So that is, that can give a partial window into perhaps why some of the recommendations haven't been implemented or taken further.

But I will ask Lisa if you have any other information.

to the privacy impact assessment and in all cases the chief technology officer has found that the limitations enacted by police department provide adequate mitigation for the civil liberties concerns raised by the working group.

So that's the primary documentation I've seen that is a response to the recommendations that were raised.

So there's just sort of a blanket we don't need these things as opposed to going through and explaining what the what the problem would be with those recommendations.

And I do understand, Madam Chair, thank you, that Lisa Kay has done that overview in the grouping.

I was more interested from, and I thank her for that.

It is helpful.

I was more interested from the executive side, understanding their arguments for why so many of the recommendations that are being made aren't making it in.

I will defer to CTO Loader, but the SIR does include explanations following the overall finding where the CTO cites where they see the recommendations having been addressed in the SIR.

But I would defer to CTO Loader on this.

Many thanks.

Thank you.

CTO loader here and yes, I where the where I have the information from a technology perspective on why a given recommendation is not technically feasible.

I have included that in my responses.

I can't speak off the top of my head to the six under deliberation today.

But by far the objections or or I wouldn't say objections, but the reasons why certain recommendations can't be taken into consideration.

or can't be implemented, let me put it that way, is really more about the way the technology is operated by the department.

So I will, by transitive property, then defer further to Captain Britt and my colleagues at SPD if there are specific questions that aren't addressed in the CTO response.

I also want to comment on the other question that Council Member Herbold raised about the order in which these technologies were considered by us.

I think certainly in the first year of the existence of the ordinance, we deliberately chose technologies that we considered to be less controversial than others, and also in order to test out the process that we put in place and to develop the timeline and the elements of the SIR that you saw presented to you.

I would say subsequent to that first batch or two, it has been a blend.

I think the acyclic technology, for example, that SDOT had implemented as well as license plate reader technologies were examples of very complex technologies that we addressed earlier in the in the process.

And you know, even today, I would say that there is a couple of the technologies on the screen in front of us that I wouldn't necessarily group in to be particularly complex, quote unquote.

So complexity is obviously subjective.

There's no, you know, definite definition of what that is, but I would say that there was not a deliberate effort overall to stack the complex technologies here at the end.

It really just worked out that way circumstantially.

Even though we did deliberately choose some less complex and less controversial technologies at the very beginning, the grouping and the process and the procedure here has really been just, you know, due to a number of factors other than complexity.

And I hope that answers your question.

Yes.

Are there any other questions from committee members before we move on to Captain Britt?

See, I am not seeing any.

OK, go ahead, please, Captain.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and good morning, everyone.

If it's all right with the chair, what I would like to do is present the information that's on each of the screens and then get into some of the answers that we were able to provide to the surveillance work group recommendations that were listed in the categories of would require SPD policy adjustments.

So there were, when the surveillance work group recommendations were sent, some of them were either addressed already would require a change to state law or would require a change to SPD policy and procedure.

So if it's all right with the chair, we'll go through the technology and then I'll answer those and then open up to any questions that remain if that's reasonable.

That's fine.

Thank you.

Can we go to the next slide, please?

Thank you.

The first technology we have to present today is the camera systems.

These are covert camera systems that are used to capture images and video of identifiable individuals, some of whom are unaware of the recording.

The covert cameras are concealed on a person or hidden on objects within a particular environment.

These cameras capture images only, they do not record sound.

On the right of the screen here is an example of what a camera might look like.

Covert camera systems are used by the police department to obtain information during criminal investigations.

These cameras are disguised and used to record specific events related to an investigation.

Go ahead and move on to the next slide, please.

and how they're used for the data collection.

When reasonable suspicion of criminal activity exists, cameras may be placed to capture plain view events in areas where no reasonable expectation of privacy exists.

When placed in areas where a reasonable expectation of privacy exists or protected areas, use of camera systems is pursuant to the Washington Privacy Act and are utilized only after obtaining appropriate consent and or legal search warrant authority.

At this moment, I want to pause just for a minute and address some of the concerns that have been raised about consent.

In Washington State, we have case law related to this aspect called state versus farrier.

And state the farrier requires that a person who is giving consent to a search to the police department is allowed to refuse the search.

They are allowed to revoke the search at any time during the process.

and they are allowed to limit the scope of that search at any time.

That's a state law that doesn't necessarily exist outside Washington state.

So Washington state law has addressed some of the concerns that have already been raised related to consent.

The protections that are in place, including the failure that I just mentioned, all deployments of these devices are documented by the technology by the TCU unit and subject to audit by the office of the inspector general and the federal monitor at any time.

All information must be gathered and recorded in a manner that is consistent with SPD policy, such that it does not reasonably infringe upon, quote, individual rights, liberties, and freedoms secured by the Constitution of the United States and of the state of Washington, including, among others, the freedom of speech, press, association and assembly, liberty of conscience, the exercise of religion, and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances or violate an individual's right to privacy.

If we can go to the next slide for just a moment.

The next slide lists policies, various policies, either in the Washington State law, in the WAC, in the RCW, in the Code of Federal Regulations, and in SPD policy that apply to the use of these camera systems.

Related to the work group questions that came up, or some of the recommendations, there were three recommendations that were listed under areas that would require SPD change in policy.

The first one was to restrict the use of these camera systems to serious and violent offenses.

The problem here, and forgive me if I get a little off what would be considered a script, the problem here is what constitutes a serious offense.

If a technology can further an investigation and be used legally and responsibly and ethically, the police department should be able to pursue that investigative option.

The problem here with the decision of what is considered a serious offense is it's very subjective.

A cell phone stolen from a vehicle in a car prowl may not be considered serious in the grand scheme.

But if that cell phone contains images of the day your child was born or the last voicemail your father, who is now passed on, left you, I imagine the owner would consider that to be a very serious offense.

And if the police department has technology that would aid them in pursuing to retrieve the property or to identify the party responsible, we should be able to do so ethically and responsibly and legally.

The second recommendation was the disclosure of the make and the models of the cameras.

The problem there was because of the nature of how these cameras are used covertly, it would allow subjects of investigations to develop countermeasures to prevent their use and negate their ability to function appropriately for what they're used for.

The third recommendation was a monthly public disclosure of the deployments of these cameras.

Once again, this recommendation has the potential to endanger investigations, not only the investigation itself, but potentially undercover officers or cooperating parties that use these cameras, as many of the investigations involving these cameras may extend beyond the month-long period.

And even redacting to a limited amount of information may very well disclose information that would endanger both investigations and personnel.

Thank you, Captain.

I did have the same thought regarding the word serious, which is not statutorily defined, and that always makes me nervous because it could introduce bias.

Are there any questions?

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

So as it relates to the related policies on this screen, one pops out at me by a street policing.

And I'm just wondering.

So these are, these are all policies that in using the camera systems, you have to follow.

And that's very helpful to understand.

But how do we How do we as a city confirm that in the use of these technologies that these are policies that are, is there data, for instance, is there data being collected that we could look at to determine that you are using these cameras in a way that is consistent with, for instance, bias-free policing?

That's one question.

The second question I have is as it relates to the consent searches, I may not have all three of the limitations that a subject can place, but I believe they can refuse, they can end, or they can reduce the scope.

And I'm wondering, is the subject told that at the time when you are seeking consent?

So in other words, Are they aware of that right to refuse, adjust the scope, or end?

And then thirdly, related to that, we have a law here in Seattle, actually I think both county and state have also passed it, sometimes referred to as the Youth Rights Ordinance, it's sometimes referred to as the My Chance Van Lack Gittens ordinance, and this is for when young people are contacted by police officers, they have a right to have a attorney notified that this contact is happening so that they have a more enhanced understanding of their rights.

And I'm wondering, Would these, and I think that this is probably a question for all of the technologies before us, would the subject of the technology, if that person was under the age, I think it's 24 and under, I believe, would that law be triggered and would that individual be afforded those rights?

Thank you.

Thank you for your questions, Councilmember.

The first question related to bias-free policing and the data that's collected, all the technology that is listed here is subject to audit by the Office of the Inspector General, and working with them, we would have to develop metrics by which we would report on that information and we would be able to provide that information as appropriate to the audit efforts.

As for the failure warnings, yes, when a person is being asked for consent, in fact, on the very top of the consent form that is generally signed in these cases, it limits it lists all three of them and you had them correct.

You have the right to refuse.

You have the right to revoke at any time.

And you have the right to limit the scope of that search.

They are told that at the lead and state law and state case law requires that the person remain present so that they can invoke that right at any time.

So I can't read these warnings to you and then go search the car.

I'm searching well away from you, so you can't revoke it.

So you have to be given not just the warnings ahead of time, but the ability to actually enact your rights during the process as well.

So yes, those are read in advance and are on top of all the forms that are used.

As for the youth, the question about whether or not I can search your property is in fact questioning, which means it would trigger that law as it relates to questioning of youth under the Youth Rights Act.

So hopefully I answered your questions.

Absolutely, thank you.

And then one other, if I may, super short.

Council Member Herbold, your voice is a little faint and garbled.

Could you sit closer to your mic?

Oh, I'm so sorry.

Is that better?

A little.

Okay.

Well, let me just try.

My last question is, if the CERN specifies that requests for use of the technology must be screened by the technical and electronic report unit supervisor.

I'm just wondering if you could talk a little bit about the screening process that the supervisor uses to approve or deny the request.

Unfortunately, I don't have firsthand knowledge of how that process works.

But as I understand it, basically, the the investigator that is that is asking to use this technology has to meet certain thresholds, which includes is the technology likely to further their investigation?

Do they have probable cause with a warrant or consent?

And then they have to run it through their chain of command within the TCU to make sure that it is appropriate.

So without direct firsthand knowledge of that, that's that's my best understanding of it.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay, I'm not seeing any other questions.

Would you please proceed to the next technology?

The next technology up is computer cell phone and mobile device extraction tools.

These are used to pull private information from the devices of individuals.

The different extraction tools SPD utilizes for mobile devices work similarly to one another.

A mobile device is physically connected to a computer workstation with a specialized locally installed software.

or to a standalone device with a similar software installed.

The software is able to bypass, decipher, or disable the device's PIN password and extract files containing data from the mobile devices.

SPD utilizes electronic device extraction and imaging technologies to recover digital information or data from computers, cell phones, and mobile devices as part of a criminal investigation.

These technologies are utilized only with the device owner's consent or pursuant to search warrant authority.

Extraction tools allow investigators to legally collect evidentiary information for ongoing investigations that may be used to prosecute crimes.

These tools allow investigators to extract data quickly and securely from a wide variety of devices and preserve evidence from these devices in a forensically sound condition, which can then be presented in court.

Next slide, please.

Data extraction devices are utilized only after legal standards of consent or court-issued warrant have been met.

Extraction tools for mobile devices, excluding computer imaging, collect information from electronic devices, including contact lists, call logs, SMS messages, and MMS messages, and GPS locations.

computer imaging.

I'm sorry I'm seeing colleagues looking trying to track and I'm sorry I should have mentioned this earlier.

The order of two and three is reversed here so we are technically looking at item three on the agenda but it is second in your presentation so I'm sorry if that has been confusing people that are trying to track along.

Thank you.

Please continue.

Sorry about that folks.

The computer imaging collects an entire image of computers hard drive at a specific point in time data collected from the extractions is provided to the requesting officer or detective for inclusion in the investigation file and is stored following evidence guidelines.

For the protections, all device utilization is documented and subject to audit by the Office of the Inspector General and the Federal Monitor at any time.

All information must be gathered and recorded in a manner that is consistent with SPD policy 6.060, such that it does not reasonably infringe upon, and I'll read the quote again because I think it's important.

quote, individual rights, liberties, and freedoms secured by the Constitution of the United States and of the state of Washington, including, among others, the freedom of speech, press, association, and assembly, liberty of conscience, the exercise of religion, and the right to petition government for redress of grievances or violate an individual's right to privacy.

Next slide, please.

And once again, this lists the different state laws and department policies that govern the use of these technologies and ensure their proper usage.

Regarding the recommendations, and forgive me, I believe I have most of them here.

The first recommendation was similar to the one in camera systems regarding restricting the use to serious and violent offenses.

And the problem with that is the same that was posted previously.

The second recommendation was disclosing the make and model of the devices that are used for this purpose.

And once again, the same objection exists that it would allow the subject of the investigation to develop countermeasures.

There's a recommendation here that SPD be prohibited from signing non-disclosure agreements with vendors.

The surveillance ordinance itself requires us to disclose the use of this technology.

So it would prohibit us from being able to engage in such a non-disclosure.

There's a recommendation here for a month.

Hold on, I'm going to stop you there because Council President Juarez has a question.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

I'm sorry, you're whipping through here and I was getting a little confused.

So we are doing number three, which is number two.

Number three, we're still on number three.

Okay, great.

Okay, so just slow down a minute here.

Okay.

First of all, thank Elisa Kay for all the information.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for pulling all this together.

So in general, just maybe we can do this on the next public hearing on this.

We're focusing on the data collection, the storage, who possesses or maintains the information, whether or not the information stays on the software or within SPD files.

So I understand, and this may be in general as you're going forward, there's a distinction between like number four is geo time and number six is tracking device and number three I'm looking at, which is actually number two.

But anyway, I'm just going to not crash data, but the cell phone stuff, all of that.

When you say is it kept, it's not kept on the software.

Would you be able to tell us as you're going through each, each section, each device.

What's kept what is I'm assuming is not kept on the software, but is kept within SPD within investigation files.

Certainly, ma'am.

So OK, so that way and I just so I'm clear.

So when we if you if you tee it up that way, then I know that, OK, it's not on the software.

It's an SPD possession with or with a warrant or court order, however you what, however you deem that.

And then it's in the investigative files limited to that event.

So that just helps me clarify my thinking.

I know we have six memos here and then we have stuff from other folks as well.

And if you could do that, that would be real helpful.

Certainly, ma'am.

Thank you.

So in the case of the...

cell phone, computer, and mobile device extraction tools.

The information is extracted from the device directly onto an SPD computer, and then it is loaded to a flash drive, which is given to the investigator, which is then uploaded either to that investigator's computer for analysis right there, or stored within our digital evidence management systems, depending on the size of the file and the ability to upload to our storage systems in that regard.

The tool itself, does not store information and it does not transmit that information anywhere outside of SPD.

It is kept locally on that drive right there.

If I'll finish up here and then I can get some of the additional questions.

The monthly report of deployment of this device, it is possible to do this because it's a limited group of people that have, or a limited number of people that have the use of this tool.

It could be considered burdensome on already tasked detectives, but would certainly be part of what I imagine the Office of the Inspector General will require during their audits of this technology.

And we will comply, of course, with that requirement.

The destruction of information unrelated and what I noted here is that the extracted data is given to the investigating detective.

The information gathered under warrant is stored in accordance with electronic evidence policies and practices.

And so that's unfortunate.

I know that seems vague, but it's the best answer I can give in this case because there are state laws as it governs the destruction of information that's gathered by the police department.

So we'll need to make sure that legally speaking that we have the ability to destroy certain things.

certainly if we have no investigative interest in it, we would certainly want to get rid of that information.

We have no interest in hanging on to things that don't further our investigation, but we want to make sure we don't run afoul of retention requirements under law.

And I'm open to any questions that council may have.

I am scrolling through here.

Please speak up if I am missing you.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you so much.

So this was a question that I had asked earlier and rather than just having you repeat the answer, I'm going to ask sort of my next iteration of the answer to the question.

So again, going back to collecting data that confirms that the department is acting in accordance with these policies, let's again use bias-free policing as an example.

You had mentioned that the way that would be confirmed would be working with the Office of the Inspector General to develop metrics and then reporting to the Office of the Inspector General on those metrics.

The ordinance requires, I believe, that the department propose metrics, and I don't believe the department has.

And so can you just talk a little bit about why that might be and why you're not including that part of the obligations under the ordinance at this stage and why you're instead suggesting that they be deferred until the time that you're working with the city auditor, I mean, sorry, the Office of the Inspector General on their statutorily required audits.

That's one question.

And then the other question is about accessory technology.

Is there accessory technology to the extraction tools?

For instance, the ability to search photos by face, build network maps from contact information, which I think is sort of, well, from contact information, it's a little different than geotime, but just in general, accessory technology, do the extraction tools, are they also covered by the particular server for this technology?

So I know that some of the companies that develop the technology that we're talking about here have some of those accessories.

SPD is not currently using any of those accessories.

That being said, some of the things you're talking about, such as like link analysis between contacts, is covered under a different SIR for I2I base, which is already approved by city council.

in prior hearings.

So information gathered from these tools could be subject to the use of those other technologies if it furthers an investigative effort.

But those have already been approved under a different SIR.

As it relates to the accessories that are available from some of the different companies that provide these tools, SPD does not currently subscribe to any of those capabilities or services at this time.

And if you did, you would have to come back.

Yes, ma'am, that would be a fundamental shift, and we would have to go through the amended SIR process.

The second question you had regarding the metrics, I assure you there's nothing nefarious about us not including them.

In the past, you yourself, I believe, have been responsible for adding amendments to several of the prior SIRs.

And forgive me, but in my head, I counted on you doing the same in this particular case.

And so perhaps that was my oversight, and I apologize for that.

SPD will certainly work to establish the metrics that would be appropriate to meet any of the requirements set forth by council.

We noodle these things constantly about how we can best provide that answer.

And a lot of cases, it's just a matter of the demographics of the people to whom this technology is being subjected.

And so that would be a part of that audit that we would meet.

But I'm certainly more than open to working on those metrics if required.

Very, very appreciated.

Thank you.

And then, Madam Chair, just one last question on this one, if I may.

Yeah, I wanted to make a point to that, to the to the equity metrics, because I've been thinking about this and then I'll then I'll get to you after that.

But since it's topical, I've been thinking about, well, what should those metrics be ever since we started?

Well, since I entered into this process with Group A and, you know, is it would there is an argument to be said that it would also incorporate the you know, the the victims of crime that are also impacted in addition to the perpetrators.

And on the part of the victims, I wanted to, I noticed in the minutes from page, from July 13th, this was of the surveillance working group, minutes.

Kayla Neal is a member and she was bringing up the benefits for her work as an advocate for as a victim advocate.

And she said that this is a very important tool for investigating and prosecuting domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking crimes.

And without it and without access to it, the majority of these cases would be severely impacted.

So something to also think about when developing those metrics going forward.

And thank you for previewing that request.

Okay, Council Member Herbold.

Thank you so much.

My last question on this particular technology relates to what policies you have in place to limit interaction with the content of what is extracted while conducting your investigation.

Obviously a lot of this information is sensitive and personal information on people's phones and computers.

And I'm just wondering what it is the department does again to limit the access to the content to only those involved in the investigation.

So the first thing regarding this is that the information that is gathered is only to be used for law enforcement purposes only, and that's covered under policy.

Secondarily, the nature of the information that is extracted from the phone is subject to limitation by judicial oversight.

When the warrant is applied for, the judge has the ability to limit the scope of what can be extracted and searched on the phone.

at which point we would only be allowed to extract or gather that which is authorized by warrant.

If a judge says I can't have a certain something that is within the phone, then I can't extract that certain thing or I have to remove that from the search parameters when going in to extract the information.

Otherwise, information that's gathered from the phone is used for law enforcement purposes.

And that may not be a wholly satisfactory answer.

I understand it probably doesn't get where you're trying to go, but the judges are able to limit the scope and law enforcement is responsible to use the information appropriately in investigative efforts.

Thank you.

So I was asking myself that, and that is something that is mentioned in these minutes.

And so, for example, would you Would you would you search text by date range or something like that?

Is that what you're talking about or, you know, photos or something like that?

I'm just really trying to get a sense of how that could work.

If I were to apply for a warrant, the judge has the ability to limit that scope.

If I were to say I want to go in and search, you know, everything in this phone, Because I think this person did this thing on this one date on this one time, because the probable cause statement in the warrant has to spell out what I'm looking for, why I'm looking for, and why I think it's germane to the crime that I'm investigating.

The judge has the ability to say, yeah, you can have that, or no, the information prior to this date would not be related to your case.

So the judges have the ability to limit the scope of what we can search within the phone.

And anything that were extracted from that and then later tried to be used in trial would be thrown out in pretrial hearings as inadmissible because it was gained without a warrant.

So there's two different layers of judicial oversight that go into what we gather and what we can use.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions on this?

Comments?

Councilmember Nelson, sorry, Chair Nelson, as a side to what you were mentioning previous about victims, it's also worth noting that these tools are used heavily in relation to internet crimes against children investigations related to child pornography and have aided in the investigation and capture and prosecution of some pretty disgusting predators that prey on kids specifically over the internet using these tools or using these technologies.

Got it.

Thank you for that reminder.

I remember reading that in either Lisa's memo or the SIR itself.

Thanks.

Okay, let's go on.

Item two, coming up third.

Yes, thanks.

So I'll pause for a moment to make sure that everybody knows that we're speaking about crash data retrieval tools, make sure everybody can get to the notes that they had appropriate for that.

And now we'll go ahead and get into it.

Crash data retrieval tools are important technology used to aid investigators in the reconstruction of traffic collisions.

Nearly all passenger vehicles sold in the United States since 2013 have an onboard event data recorder or EDR.

which automatically records important technical information during a critical event such as a collision.

These EDR units only record information when certain events occur, such as when airbags deploy or when sensors detect a collision and do not have interfaces which display the information.

These tools allow investigators to download and view this information.

SPD utilizes CDR tools in the reconstruction of traffic collisions.

These tools allow investigators access to information recorded by vehicles around the time of critical events that are associated, excuse me, with vehicle collisions.

The CDR technology utilized by SPD is required to download and view any data recorded by the EDR units.

Next slide, please.

CDR tools.

collect information stored in vehicle EDR units.

These tools are utilized only after legal standards of consent and or court issued warrant have been met in the investigation of a traffic collision.

SPD uses CDR tools when it investigates collisions involving specific circumstances, such as the death of any person, life-threatening injuries, hit and run collisions, collisions involving substantial bodily injury where it appears a driver was negligent or under the influence of alcohol and or other drugs, vehicular homicide, felony eluding, felony DUI, and other vehicular crimes.

CDR tools are utilized only after legal standards of consent and or court-issued warrant have been met, as required by the Washington Privacy Act.

Use of CDR tools is constrained to the conditions stipulated by consent and or court order, which provides the legal authority and the scope of collection.

All use of CDR tools are documented and subject to audit by the Office of the Inspector General and the Federal Monitor at any time.

Next slide will contain the list of different policies and laws that apply to the use of this technology.

There were three recommendations from the surveillance work group.

The first was the limitation of the warrants.

The scope of the warrant, as we spoke previously, is subject to judiciary approval at the time of issuance.

So the judge has the ability to tell us what we can and can't collect as it relates to the warrant.

We have to make a case for why we need to collect certain information.

The fourth recommendation is the same that was on two of our previous technologies, which was making the equipment identification publicly available.

The SPD doesn't object to the public disclosure of this only in some, and it certainly doesn't because of the nature of the other two.

This doesn't endanger our ability to collect information or allow the subject of an investigation to develop countermeasures.

The problem here is that crash data retrieval and the EDR technology within vehicles adapts so quickly with different year, make and models of vehicles that if I simply list the tools that are used and council says, yes, you can use these tools, If next year Honda develops a different EDR interface and I need a different tool, I would need to come right back and continually be asking for updates to the list of the CDR tools.

Rather, we're asking that we be allowed to use this ability and apply the appropriate tools.

But if required, we can certainly get a list together of the currently used devices that allow us to fulfill this requirement.

As for the audit log, because our Traffic Collision Investigation Squad is the only unit that uses this, TCIS can keep a log of the usage of these tools.

And I'm open to any questions that we have about this technology.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

As it relates to the the protections provided inherent to the warrant-seeking process, yes, the judge has the authority and ability to limit the scope.

But I sense that what, in some cases, we're being asked is not to rely on the judges limiting the scope of the warrant, but to ask or expect that the department limit what it's asking for rather than relying on that sort of that oversight of the judge to know the appropriate way to limit the scope according to what the investigation is.

So as it relates specifically to this particular technology, How do we ensure that a crash data retrieval does not become sort of a warrant request for just sort of a cursory search of a car?

What you want is the crash data and instead you ask for something more broad.

Is there, can we instead limit what you ask for to be focused only on the crash data, unless you have another reason to want to search the vehicle.

Well, that's exactly what the affidavit for search warrant does.

The detective that's filing for the search warrant has to articulate what data they want and why they want it.

So for example, and I think I can read between the lines here and get to what I think we're really talking about.

Investigators need the information related to what led up to and caused the collision.

They don't need the GPS data about where this vehicle has been the last 45 to 60 days necessarily.

Now, if the investigator did have grounds to need that information, they would need to include that in the affidavit for search warrant and explain to the judge why they would need that information.

And the judge would need to implicitly allow that.

The other limitation that I think exists in place in this regard is the nature of the crash data retrieval system itself.

It records information briefly prior to the collision and provides that to the investigators.

It is not just a constant, here's everything this vehicle has done for 100 years.

Now there are cars that have incredible computers on them that do all sorts of things.

We're thinking Teslas and some of these Rivians and some of these other vehicles that have computers smarter than what first put man on the moon.

But the crash data retrieval information is actually rather simplistic.

It's the telemetry of the vehicle.

What was the throttle doing?

What was the brake doing?

What controls were in activity at that time?

And so the nature of the technology itself does limit that.

And I understand that you don't necessarily want us to rely upon just the judge to limit that, but the affidavit process itself is what limits the law enforcement overreach into what we don't have a legal right to grab or to gather.

Thank you.

Appreciate that.

Go ahead, please.

On to geo time.

All right.

Let me get my notes and so that everybody can get caught up.

I know we're jumping from two to four now on the list of technologies.

GeoTime is geospatial analysis software that allows the visual analysis of events over time.

Utilizing geodata such as latitude and longitude procured during criminal investigations, investigators use GeoTime to create specialized two- and three-dimensional maps of call records and cell site locations.

These maps allow investigators to see patterns in the existing data that might not be interpreted through other methods.

I think it's important for me to pause here and just kind of go off the script for a moment and make people understand this does not gather cell site location data.

This does not gather latitude and longitude.

This simply allows the investigator to input that data into geotime to display it in a manner that takes into account the passage of time.

so that we can see the data in a four-dimensional, if you will, process to understand how that data moved throughout the period and during which a crime was being committed.

Why do we use this technology?

Visualizing criminal information provides investigators a more thorough understanding of complicated criminal investigations.

GeoTime reduces the time and effort required of investigators to analyze large amounts of data, which translates into a better and more efficient work product.

Next slide, please.

GeoTime does not collect information or data.

I'm going to say that again just because I know it's a serious source of concern.

GeoTime does not collect information or data.

It is a tool used to aggregate and analyze data manually input by investigators and exports complex geospatial maps which users save into locally stored investigation files.

No information is saved inside the GeoTime tool.

geotime is only used during the investigation of crimes by the police department.

all use of geotime must also comply with SPD policy 12.050, criminal justice information systems, and may only be used for legitimate criminal investigative purposes.

use of geotime is governed by the city of Seattle intelligence ordinance as well, 28 CFR part 23, CEGIS requirements, and any future applicable requirements as well.

The next slide contains all of the different recommendations, sorry, all the different lists of different policies and laws that apply to the use of this technology.

And I have a list of several different recommendations from the surveillance work group.

Recommendation number four was to limit the data input to data collected via a warrant.

And I understand the nature of this request, but I think it's important to note that information from a police report that information is not collected by warrant.

For example, when a person calls and says my business was robbed, that information is collected in a police report but not in a warrant.

I understand the intent behind this recommendation but I don't think it takes into account the fact that much of the information collected especially during the preliminary parts of the police investigation does not come with a warrant.

It comes with a person calling and saying on this date and time at this I'm not trying to sound like I'm getting argumentative with the surveillance work group or trying to split hairs here, but I think it's very important that we be careful with the requirement of a warrant in the information that's entered into there.

That being said, all information entered into GEOTIME has to be legally gathered.

And I think that would be a reasonable recommendation.

And of course, that's already within the policies and the information laid out within the SIR.

Well, can you give a real example of the kind of like you're not entering latitude and longitude, but are you entering things like address?

We could enter address.

We could also enter latitude and longitude.

If, for example, I had a warrant for a person's cell phone location during a period of time, which is a reasonable investigative tool and a judge approves the warrant and we receive that information, I may very well get latitude and longitude back from the cell phone provider as part of the warrant return.

And I may very well enter address, I may very well enter latitude and longitude.

GeoTime has the ability to overlay all that information onto a map and present it in a timely fashion.

So the example that they use on their website is actually very good.

If there's a person who's cell phone pings within a block of where they are believed to have committed an armed robbery during the same time frame, then that would be an excellent investigative tool that would help them prove the case or basically assert beyond a reasonable doubt when it comes to time to present in court.

So that's the kind of information that could be used to enter into this system.

Does that answer your question?

Yes.

And I see that Lisa has her hand up.

Yes, ma'am.

You don't have to call me ma'am, Captain.

I think one of the questions that was raised in the SIR that I'm curious about that other council members have asked about relative to what kind of input is entered into GeoTime is whether you're gathering information off of social data or social media.

um what people were having a hard time when I was briefing them on this and you had mentioned that the detective who runs this wasn't wasn't in town so so I I wasn't able to learn too much about this but people were kind of wondering what does it look like to use this tool where what what are the sources for the data and what are you the sources from the data

I'm sorry, Lisa, I didn't mean to cut you off Lisa, I'm sorry.

SPD does not currently utilize any social media crawler technology, so we are not just sending out bots that bring back information.

However, if a person's social media accounts are publicly accessible and open source, a detective may very well gather information from that and be able to create an input into geotype.

For example, if a person on their, I'm going to date myself here, if a person on their Facebook page were to check in at a certain restaurant, and that period of time is of interest to the investigation, the investigator may very well note in GeoTime that a Facebook check-in at this location at this date and time could be included in the GeoTime software.

So yes, social media information is information that detectives can rely upon, but only when it's open source and only when it's gathered directly by the investigators.

And if there are no follow-ups to that, I can get to some of the other recommendations.

I know there were several from the surveillance work group on this particular technology.

There is a follow-up.

Yes, Council President Suarez.

Thank you.

Not so much a, well, yeah, I guess it could be a follow-up.

Thank you, Lisa Kay, for your memo and all the information that we got from everybody outlining all this and some of the civil liberty impacts.

Let me ask you this, Mr. Brett.

So the time is software is used during criminal investigations.

It's it's legally gathered for real time.

I'm guessing investigations are ongoing criminal investigations that the police would use and ultimately forward to the prosecutor, not city attorneys.

We're talking about felonies here or misdemeanors and felonies.

Generally speaking, it would be used for felonies simply because the nature of the detectives that have the licenses, they investigate felonies exclusively.

That being said, similar to what we talked about about the serious level, I could see cases where if this technology could help a person investigating a string of misdemeanors, might wanna use this, that it could be a useful technology for that as well.

But yes, when it's forwarded to the prosecutor, it is generally to the King County prosecutor.

Okay, so my next question is, How or can this use by defense counsel, hopefully, for exculpatory purposes.

So this is all in the possession.

Of SBD detectives to the King County prosecutor's office, I'm guessing if they're gathering information and you were saying, like, if you're an investigation about time and places, if that would provide somebody with an alibi, or I'm just trying to think of other ways that besides how this information is being used instead of just to prosecute.

or investigate?

Certainly, this information and the use of this software to overlay the information is meant to give a detective a better understanding of what they're seeing in the overall nature of all the information that's being gathered.

Generally, these are rather complex investigations.

So let's say there's a string of robberies that have a very similar modus operandi, and they have a suspect that they have in mind for this.

They may very well be able to lay information in there and say, hey, I know he reasonably certainly did these two.

Did he do this third?

It's very possible that using the geotime software may very well exclude this person as a suspect in that investigation because their whereabouts may prove that they were nowhere near the location of that particular crime.

So when you talked about for the defense, I'm sorry to cut you off, Madam President, but When it comes to defensories, I would certainly hope that prior to a defense attorney using it for exculpatory purposes, that our investigators would have used it to exclude them as a suspect before even sending it to the prosecutor's office.

Right.

So my second question was, are all of this within Geotech, which eventually, as you say, you maintain the material for the investigation, which would be in the possession of the prosecutor, SPD, that would be subject to discovery on the defense side?

100%, yes, ma'am.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions, Madam Chair, before I proceed through some of the other recommendations?

Oh, no, we want to back up on the ROVs for just a moment, please.

Thank you.

There was a recommendation number eight from the surveillance work group was analyze impacts of any geotime outputs.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure what they mean by that, so I'd be happy to engage with folks from the surveillance work group to chat about that.

Unfortunately, I don't have a recommendation for that because I'm not sure exactly what they meant by that.

Recommendation number nine was to validate data before it's entered into GeoTime.

All data used in GeoTime is subject to validation, as is all information gathered in investigative efforts.

If a case goes to prosecution, it is again evaluated by the courts for validity in pretrial hearings prior to the to the introduction into court.

And so there's judicial oversight into that part as well.

Number 10, analyze accuracy and analytical data generated by GeoTime.

Again, with any investigative effort, the investigator is going to look at the result and determine if it's accurate or valid, and if it's introduced in court would also be subject to that pretrial judicial scrutiny as well.

Number 11 was delete data from GeoTime after outputs are exported.

And as mentioned previously, no information is saved in the GeoTime tool.

Disclose and log recipients of and the circumstances pertaining to shared geotime data.

No outside agency has access to the geotime tool used by SPD and any file sharing or information sharing from our records unit over to other agencies in the joint investigations or mutual aid processes is already documented within our records unit.

Keep an audit log of user actions.

As with all technology used by SPD, GeoTime is subject to the OIG technology audit, so we would need to maintain a log and we would comply with the OIG's requirements for that.

Restricting vendor ownership and use of data inputs and outputs.

Properly store such data.

Once again, no information is saved in the GeoTime tool, and any outputs from the GeoTime tool are subject to the storage requirements of all digital evidence.

Disclose the usage per year, and again, that would fall into the OIG audit requirements, and we would definitely comply with that.

And then prohibiting SPD from signing a nondisclosure agreement with the vendor.

As we discussed in previous technologies, the surveillance ordinance itself governs our abilities in that regard, and we would not be able to do nondisclosures as it relates to these kinds of technologies.

I'm open to any lingering questions that may exist.

Go ahead, Lisa.

Thank you, Captain.

I wasn't clear.

So on number 17, where they're asking that the vendor ownership be restricted, to your knowledge, does the vendor have access to anything that you've put into GeoTime or to that data?

No, ma'am.

Our current instances of GeoTime are localized on the devices that we use on the machines here.

Nothing ships out to my knowledge.

And in fact, some of these analyses are done on computers that aren't even networked to ensure that that data is secured.

But no, the GeoTime company does not have insight into what is being input into their tool.

So they don't have access to what you're learning?

To my knowledge, they do not have access.

And I can certainly follow up on that.

Thank you.

Okay, any other further questions?

All right, please proceed.

Thank you, ma'am.

The next technology is the remotely operated vehicles, and I appreciate the Chair's mention ahead of time that this does not include unmanned aerial vehicles or what are commonly referred to in the public as drones.

That is a whole separate topic that we'll save for another day, I'm sure.

Remotely operated vehicles are unarmed, remote-controlled vehicles utilized by SPD SWAT team, arson and bomb squad, and harbor units to access areas that are potentially dangerous for personnel to physically enter.

All SPD ROVs are controlled by SPD employees operating handheld controllers from a safe position nearby.

Some ROVs operated by SPD have a remotely controlled arm capable of performing simple tasks safely from a remote location.

The use of ROVs allow tactical units to assess potentially dangerous situations from a safe position.

By entering an environment with the additional information obtained using remote cameras or having rendered safe a suspicious package, SPD personnel and community members are safer.

The harbor unit utilizes ROVs to perform necessary underwater search and recovery functions that would not be possible with manned diving alone.

Next slide, please.

No images or data are stored or retained by ROVs used by the SWAT or arson and bomb units.

The harbor unit ROVs store video and sonar imagery captured during each deployment of the unit.

Only images directly related to the specific search and recovery are manually exported from the ROV's onboard hard drive if requested by SPD detectives for follow-up investigation.

For the protections there is no legal standard or condition for the use of these are these in non protected public areas such as hotel hallways or public waterways.

However, if the use of the RV is to occur inside a protected area such as inside a person's home or property absent exigent circumstances or consent a signed warrant is obtained from a judge.

There's a list of the policies and procedures and state laws on the next slide there that govern the use of this technology.

If we can go to the next slide.

Thank you very much.

We're getting used to seeing that list, which is good.

The next, for the surveillance work group recommendations, Recommendation three was prohibit recording by a cell phone, and I will certainly evaluate the addition of that to the policy.

I'll work with our policy shop to see if that's a feasible addition to policy.

It seems like a reasonable policy addition.

Number six was the deletion of non-investigative data.

This recommendation may be subject to retention policies set forth by state law.

We'll evaluate that and make sure that we can comply with the requirements set forth there.

Number seven is that the recording or the information gathered never leave SPD equipment.

I understand the intent behind this, but in the event when SWAT, harbor, or arson and bomb assist other agencies with call-outs, explosive devices, or swimmer search and retrieval, body retrievals, this requirement would negate the existing mutual aid agreements.

For example, if If SPD Harbor goes out and assists Kirkland PD with finding a missing swimmer off their shoreline, we would need to be able to give them the information that's gathered by the ROV so that they could retrieve the person.

Number eight, log of usage and access.

The multiple units within SPD operate multiple types of ROVs in various environments.

It would require a bureaucratic level of of of insertion to gather all that information into a single location.

If that's something that the I G's audit ends up requiring SPD will work to comply with that.

Number 9 was the monthly report to the public.

And there's no nice way for me to say this but what basically comes down to is this recommendation creates a heavy public reporting burden.

on the department that is already understaffed.

And as everybody knows, our public disclosure unit is already heavily tasked with existing public disclosure requests.

So to create a monthly report to the public from various different units, while doable, would be quite burdensome on the department.

And I'm open to any questions that exist regarding these technologies.

Okay, I'm scanning to see if there are any questions.

I'm not seeing any.

All right, let's move on through, please.

The last technology up for us to talk about today.

I believe it's the last one.

Correct me if I'm wrong, please.

Thank you.

Tracking devices.

Geolocation trackers are cellular devices that SPD utilizes as a tool to locate and track the movements and locations of vehicles.

These trackers are location tracking devices that report latitude and longitude, as well as other device information, such as high temperature alerts, device removal, power shutdown alerts, and battery levels.

The primary benefit of these tracking systems is in the gathering of evidence used in the resolution of criminal investigations.

Proper gathering of location evidence of criminal activity by the police supports SPD's mission to prevent crime, enforce the law, and support quality public safety.

Trackers allow SPD to remotely track vehicles electronically.

They also allow SPD to locate vehicles and individuals that are sought in connection with an active investigation.

They are only utilized with consent of a witness, a confidential informant, or within the scope of a judicially issued search warrant.

Next slide, please.

Tracking devices are only utilized with express consent or search warrant authority.

These devices report latitude and longitude coordinates on a predetermined schedule that can be adjusted by users remotely.

Data collected from the tracking devices is provided to the requesting officer or detective for inclusion in the investigation file and is stored following evidence guidelines.

All deployments of these devices are documented by the TCU unit and subject to audit by the Office of the Inspector General and the Federal Monitor at any time.

All information must be gathered and recorded in a manner that is consistent with SPD policy 6.060, such that it does not reasonably infringe upon, quote, individual rights, liberties, and freedoms secured by the Constitution of the United States and of the State of Washington, including, among others, the freedom of speech, press, association, and assembly, and the right to petition government for redress of grievances or violate an individual's right to privacy." The next slide is the various policies and laws that govern the usage of this technology by the Seattle Police Department. Next slide for everybody's viewing, please. Thank you. And then related to the surveillance workgroup recommendations, once again, it mentions that never leaves SPD equipment. That was one of the recommendations that was was pushed forward similar to the ROVs. Once again, in joint investigations with other agencies, this recommendation would negate mutual aid agreements, such as the Violent Crime Task Force or the Joint Terrorism Task Force, some of the other groups that we work with in these regards. Number four, disclosing the make and model, similar to what we talked about with the cameras. Disclosing the make and model of the tracking devices would allow the subject of investigations to develop certain countermeasures that could inhibit the investigation. Number five was the monthly public disclosure of deployments. Similar to the cameras, this recommendation has real potential to endanger investigations as investigations often extend beyond the monthly period. And number 10 validating the accuracy of the data collected all data collected during investigations is validated for accuracy by the investigator, it is again validated during pre trial hearings overseen by a judge. I think it's important to mention in the because I know everybody gets very concerned about tracking devices and understandably so that these devices are only placed with consent and knowledge of the person who's having them placed or. with a judicially issued warrant which required the detective to file the affidavit that explained what they wanted to do, when they wanted to do it, and why they believed that it would forward their investigative process. And then the judge would have to approve or limit the scope depending or deny it entirely depending on the nature of the affidavit. We recently, and it's worth mentioning that we recently requested an amendment to this that was administrated by nature. In the beginning of 2020, cell providers in the U.S. announced that the existing 3G cell networks would be decommissioned in 2022. Many of the existing tracking devices were tied to the old 3G network. and SPD filed a paperwork with the privacy office at Seattle IT to upgrade the existing 3G trackers to the 5G network to ensure their continued functionality. They did not add any functionality that didn't already exist on the 3G network. And I'm open to any questions that the council has about these technologies.

Go ahead, Lisa.

Thank you, Captain Britt, I think I mentioned to you one of the council members I was briefing on this asked whether this these trackers are are used or could be used to track fleeing vehicles so as a way to reduce the need for high speed chases.

I'm glad you brought that up.

And I know that the council member in question probably saw the recent report out of Redmond PD about a technology called StarChase.

StarChase is a technology that is not a part of this discussion, but I'll talk about it briefly anyway.

It's basically a launcher that can either be handheld or mounted to a vehicle that when pulling in behind, say, a stolen car, can launch a tracker onto the vehicle and rather than having to chase it through the streets creating a hazard to the public, officers can simply track it electronically and recover it from wherever it goes still.

SPD does not use star chase.

We do not have technology that gives us the capability currently to attach a device to a vehicle that is actively fleeing.

SPD is certainly interested in evaluating star chase in a future state and we will engage with Council and the required approval processes within the surveillance ordinance prior to the procurement Legally speaking, a tracker can be attached to a fleeing vehicle involved in a crime as long as probable cause exists.

But right now, SPD does not have that technical capability.

Hopefully I answered that question.

Very well.

So is that is that sort of brand new technology?

And that brings up another question, which is, have you technology changes very quickly?

And so have you put in for or requested the purchase of any technology that could be deemed surveillance capable since in the past couple years, or at least since this has been implemented.

We've submitted privacy reviews for all technology and we've been very conscious of the surveillance requirements and have not requested the purchase of new surveillance technology that is not covered by existing SIRs that are already approved or in the process of being approved.

It's a long way of saying no.

We have evaluated StarChase.

We attended a demonstration of it to see if it was worthwhile.

We wanted to find out how it works in the rain.

We are exploring the idea, but we are not putting in a purchase request until we have cleared the privacy requirement hurdles that are placed before us within the surveillance ordinance.

Okay, thank you very much.

Are there any questions, follow up on this or any of the other technologies that we've covered today?

Let's see.

I am not seeing any.

What?

Oh, I'm sorry.

My bad.

I was using my real hand instead of my virtual hand.

My fault.

Yeah, just a quick question around how SPD can go about ensuring that it is not collecting data that might be sort of circumstantially located in the same place as the subject of your investigation.

So, for instance, often many family members will share a vehicle.

if the tracking device results in data that is collected about someone not under investigation of a crime, how do you limit that?

Well, the the nature of the ownership and usage of the vehicle would be part of the affidavit of search warrant that's filed with the judge.

And any information that's not germane to the case would simply be excluded.

So we don't really have an investigative interest in finding out where the subject of an investigation's teenage child takes the car on a Friday night.

So that information wouldn't necessarily be useful to us.

And while while possibly collected, it's not germane to the case and therefore wouldn't wouldn't be of interest to us.

So yeah, I mean, you can't keep it from being collected because you wouldn't know in the collection process.

Correct, which is why it was related to, which is why we would need to disclose during the affidavit process who has ownership of the vehicle.

Is it a sole ownership vehicle?

Is it a vehicle that is shared among family members?

And then the judge has the authority to either say, yes, you can collect this or no, I'm too concerned about the peripheral information that could be collected, come up with a different method.

OK, thank you.

Thank you.

Was, were the tracking devices technologies used in, well, I, nevermind, I was gonna ask you about a case that we've, there have been a lot of publicized stories about drug seizures on the West Coast and the coordination, multi-state coordination.

I was going to ask if that is, if this technology is used often in interstate investigations, but nevermind, probably not.

I think it is worth mentioning councilmember Herbold as well.

I appreciate the difference there.

I think it is worth noting the use of geotime software in conjunction with tracking devices would help mitigate the concern you raised about peripheral data that is collected that is not germane to the case.

Geotime would allow us to privy to the investigation or appropriate for the investigative effort, so we can exclude that data as appropriate.

So the use of these two technologies in conjunction can actually help alleviate that very concern.

President Juarez.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

These are, again, just more overarching questions of all six of the items that are in front of us.

with the analysis from our own Lisa Kay and going through some of the concerns and what was offered up.

So I know that we went through each device.

We talked about, you know, whether or not the device is, you know, legally gathered by a judicial warrant or consent.

Then we talked about kind of like the software, if it's maintained on the software, and then when it's maintained by SPD or the King County Prosecutor's Office or the detective.

And then the length of that being what I'm hearing is that if it is retained by not on the software, but by the detective or the King County Prosecutor's Office or SPD is for the length of the investigation.

I guess one of the concerns I would have is.

That that could be what a week or it could be 10 years, and is there a way to or is that am I am I overstepping here and asking if there's a way to minimize that, or is that just what it is, the length of the investigation?

Because that's a lot of data to maintain forever, I guess.

It sure is Madam President, and one of the things that we run into is actually the retention periods required by statute of limitation investigations.

So it's not just the length of the investigation.

State law actually governs the retention requirements related to specific criminal crimes and specific investigative efforts.

For example, if a person is tried and convicted, we actually have to continue to retain that information beyond even the conviction because of the nature of the appeals process and the information that it's gathered has to be available to both prosecutors and future defense attorneys as it relates to their appeals.

So the retention is actually specific to the type of crime and SPD is bound by law to abide by those.

So I'm just mindful of the backdrop of the civil liberties questions that have been raised in regards to like an example, like with geotime.

And like you say, there are statute of limitations.

There are times where investigations do go on and certainly more gathering.

So that is kind of where my focus has been on that.

So thank you for answering that.

Thank you, ma'am.

I hope I did.

It's a lot.

So thank you.

My pleasure.

I remember that came up last time, and I was thinking, yeah, you're absolutely correct that the appeals process can go on.

And then what happens if the statute of limitations, for example, in rate change?

So anyway, Council Member Herbold, yes.

Thank you.

My recollection is in some of the other technologies, while there is state statute that identifies what are the retention policies, that in some instances we were hearing that the departments and I don't know if this was SPD or maybe it could have been SDOT were planning to keep the data for a longer period of time.

And so we may have proposed amendments that aligned the city retention policies with what is required by state law.

Are there do you have any knowledge of any examples of when These technologies might have internal city retention policies that are longer than that required by state law.

Yes, ma'am.

Without getting to specific examples because I don't have any offhand and I apologize for that.

SPD is bound by the retention requirements to hold them for a minimum period.

And we would love to rely strictly and specifically on the minimum and go by that in most cases.

Unfortunately, many of our accountability partners, including OPA, OIG and the Community Police Commission have wanted us to retain certain technologies, specifically body worn video and in car video for longer periods in the state mandated retention period.

because they aid in ongoing internal investigations into officer misconduct or other allegations against SPD employees.

So there is a retention work group that gets together, and we are trying to kind of bring all of this into a more reasoned fashion.

And I know Council President Juarez brought up the sheer mountain of data that we're speaking to here, and you've brought up the civil liberty concerns with retaining things beyond the required period.

But we have we have several different stakeholders that are working.

We're trying to work with to get a more concrete format of how we retain this data.

Unfortunately, it's just not black and white when it comes to we have criminal investigation and we have also internal investigation.

Everything cuts both ways, huh?

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Okay, so that concludes the briefing and discussion for today.

I would like to turn back to our partners over here at Seattle IT and ask if you have any questions or comments or anything you want to leave us with.

No further questions for me.

Thank you for having us today and thank you for the discussion.

Okay, I am mindful that I think that there are a couple more technologies and Is that the case?

What remains in group B, if any?

There are two remaining technologies that council granted an extension for that were part of group B for March 1st, I believe.

And those are hostage negotiation throw phones and Call Yo.

Okay, thank you very much.

All right, everybody.

Thank you very much for a pretty smooth discussion of a lot of technology.

So it is 1126 on February 8th and the economic development technology in City Light.

Oh, I'm supposed to ask for other business.

Excuse me.

Go ahead.

Well, I just wanted Lisa Kay to have an opportunity to go over sort of what her process is for developing amendments.

And I think we probably have some deadlines.

Oh, yes.

I forgot to invite her to talk about that.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Yes, we have a very short turnaround time for amendments, as has been done actually for most of these surveillance.

So I'm asking that you, if you have amendments, let me know by closing business this Friday.

You don't have to give me anything fully baked.

You can just say I'm sort of thinking about this, but that allows me to get started working with any sort of legal review that might come into play or some analysis that might need to be done.

to help craft the best amendment.

So that's the deadline, close of business this Friday for amendments.

That's all I had, Madam Chair.

Okay, well, I also want to thank my colleagues.

Thank you, President Juarez and Council Member Herbold for coming today.

Without you, we would be set back.

So I really appreciate your diligence coming.

All right, with that, it is now 1127 on February 8th, and this meeting is adjourned.

Thank you.

Thank you, Lisa Kay.