Technology transforms interview recording

Impact Marcom and Reliance High-Tech have launched a new media platform for recording interviews with suspects and witnesses.

Traditional cassette tape recorders have been synonymous with police interviews for over 20 years, but the new video and audio recording system looks set to revolutionise the capture and retrieval of interview evidence.

VADER (video audio digital evidence recorder) digitally records suspect or witness interviews and delivers removable digital discs in line with current PACE guidelines. Coupled with VADER Server, the interview is then streamed and stored on a central secure database.

Accessed via a secure web interface, the interviews held on the server can be retrieved by approved personnel. Suspects could be brought to court more quickly as statements will be available for tape summarisers within minutes rather than days. This will eliminate the need to put discs in the post and help prevent potential lapses in security.

Rather than listening through multiple tapes, innovative speech recognition technology allows key word searching, and evidence can be identified within seconds from a comprehensive database of digital footage.

VADER combines technology from the broadcast industry with specialist recording software already in use in European police forces, creating a platform that complies with current and future legislation.

Julian Phillips, md of Impact Marcom said: “By applying proven technology from the broadcast industry, we are able to give the police instant and secure access to their own video and audio content – in effect, their own secure content management tool.”