Over the weekend Bloomington residents shopping at the Kroger at 2nd and South College began noticing a mysterious portable trailer with solar power, and cameras, which were positioned to film everybody and everything in the parking lot. The device is marked as belonging to a company called, LiveView Technologies.
The device, known as a “Lot Cop,” has previously been deployed at a Wal Mart Super Center in the past according to an article in the Roanoke News:
And was also deployed in Alabama:
The device at the downtown Bloomington Kroger also has at least two standard video cameras, and another that appears to be a 360 degree camera, which will film in all directions. The cameras are mounted on a pole extended above the parking lot.
Over the weekend a local tech expert, whose identity has been confirmed by The Bloomington, but who wishes to remain anonymous posted the following information on Reddit about the device:
According to the Reddit link the device is connected by LTC (cell) wifi using the following frequency: 862.94MHz , with 1.4MHz bandwidth, and possibly uses other LTE channels as well.
The Reddit post goes further, “Device, according to screenshots of the UI can identify “people”, “vehicles”, and possibly other objects. Unsure if it can accurately identify individuals using facial recog. Would be safe to assume yes.”
The Bloomingtonian reached out by e-mail to public relations at Kroger’s national, and regional offices, but did not immediately get a response with information on why the “spy tower” was deployed in Bloomington. Therefore, The Bloomingtonian is unable to confirm if Kroger deployed the device.
During the morning police briefing The Bloomington was told local police had no knowledge the device was being deployed, and there had been no recent spike in crime in the area of the Kroger.
Live View Tech is a government contractor, and has been working on projects with the United States Department of Homeland Security, and an Israeli security company according to posts on the company’s Facebook page:
A news article in the Times of Israel reads, “Cawamo (Hod Hasharon, Israel) and LiveView Technologies (Orem, Utah) will develop a fully turnkey AI-based analytics video security solution for remote sites.”
The Bloomington photographed the device, and is providing images here.
This article will be updated if more information becomes available.
