Edmonton police partner with local tech firm to employ autistic technicians in body-cam video redaction services

An Edmonton police officer wears a body camera in an undated photo. (Credit: Edmonton Police Service)

The Edmonton Police Service (EPS) announced Wednesday it has entered into a partnership with a local technology firm that employs people with autism to edit video from body cameras worn by officers.

EPS said it is entering into an agreement with Technology North after they successfully finished a research development project together over the last six months.

The project used four of Technology North's employees who are on the autism spectrum to do work of redacting video footage from body-worn cameras.

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"This very instrumental partnership will become more and more important to the service that we get to provide Edmontonians and Albertans in relation to body worn video," Supt. Derek McIntyre of the police's information and analytics division said Wednesday during a media conference.

"During the research project, we took a lot of various steps in relation to the accuracy and the quality assurance of the redactions (by) the Technology North employees."

He said the quality and speed of video redaction by the Technology North employees was as quick and accurate as that done by EPS ones.

According to an EPS news release, the Technology North staff work alongside other redaction specialists to remove body-cam footage that may infringe on the rights of people not directly related to a police interaction, including those walking by a scene, licence plates and computer or phone screens that may contain private information.

"This is precisely what we wanted from our research project and is one of the driving reasons beyond wanting to be clearly an inclusive employer," McIntyre said.

Police say the work suits the talents of workers on the autism spectrum.

"It requres dedication, deep focus, attention to detail," said Ling Huang, chief executive officer of Technology North. "That’s exactly the characteristics of the autistic team."

EPS officers started using body-worn cameras on a trial basis in July 2023, followed by a phased implementation of them across the service that started in September this year. The EPS says the phased introduction of body cameras is expected to continue through 2025 to about 1,400 officers.

Huang said the partnership is "meaningful for the autism community." His son, Brian, was one of four people on the autism spectrum who were involved in the recent pilot.

"With Edmonton police continuing to roll out body cams, and also the province continuing to look at body cams, we think we can increase our autism employment across Alberta by probably sometime next year to 100 people very, very easily," Huang said on Wednesday.