Acronyms and Abbreviations

OP Appendix of Surveillance Equipment & Abbreviations

ACDA Alameda County District Attorney
ACLU American Civil Liberties Union
AG Attorney General
ALCO Alameda County
ALPR Automated License Plate Reader
ANPR Automatic Number Plate Reader
APC/ APV Armored Personnel Carrier/Vehicle
APTP Anti Police-Terror Project
ARIES Automated Regional Information Exchange System – law enforcement information sharing system
ARJIS Automated Regional Justice Information System (San Diego) – law enforcement information sharing system
AROC Arab Resource and Organizing Center (member of the Urban Shield Coalition)
ARREST Automated Records Retrieval and Electronic Sharing Technology (Eastern Washington) – law enforcement information sharing system
ATF Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (a federal agency like the FBI)
BART Bay Area Rapid Transit (has an elected Board)
#berkmtg Hashtag for Berkeley City Council meetings
BIMA Biometrics Identity Management Agency
BoS (generic) – Board of Supervisors (for a County, e.g., the Alameda County Board of Supervisors), legislative body for a County
BPD Berkeley Police Department
BRDC Bill of Rights Defense Committee
CalECPA CA Electronic Communications Privacy Act
CIA Central Intelligence Agency
CCOPS Community Control of Police Surveillance
CJIS Criminal Justice Information Services (FBI)
CPRA California Public Records Act
CSS Cell Site Simulator (IMSI catcher, Stingray)
CVE Countering Violent Extremism – FBI Curriculum
DA District Attorney
DAC Domain Awareness Center
DHS Department of Homeland Security
DNI Director of National Intelligence
DNS Domain Name Servers [How one looks up a website if you know the name]
DOJ Department of Justice
EBX East Bay Express
EBRPD East Bay Regional Parks District (has police!)
EFF Electronic Frontier Foundation
EPCA Electronic Privacy Communications Act (Now CA law – no search of electronic devices without a warrant)
FBI Federal Bureau of Investigation
FIRS Fingerprint Identification Records System
FISA Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act
FLIR Forward Looking InfraRed
FOIA Freedom of Information Act (federal)
FR/FRT Facial Recognition / Facial Recognition Technology
Fusion Center Information sharing center designed to promote information sharing at the federal level
GAP Government Accountability Project
HIDTA High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area
IAFIS Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System
ICE Immigration and Customs Enforcement
IDENT Automated Biometric Identification System (DHS database)
IMS Intelligence Management System
IMSI International Mobile Subscriber Identifier
ISP Internet Service Provider
JTTF Joint Terrorism Task Force
MBARK Multimodal Biometric Application Resource Kit
MOU Memorandum of Understanding
NCHIDTA Northern California High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area
NCIC National Crime Information Center
NCRIC Northern California Regional Intelligence Center
NCRTTAC Northern California Regional Terrorism Threat Assessment Center
NGA National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency
NGI Next Generation Identification
NIST National Institute of Standards and Technology
NSA National Security Agency
NSA Negotiated Settlement Agreement (re: OPD)
#oakmtg Hashtag for Oakland City Council, Committee and Police Commission meetings
OJC Oakland Justice Coalition
OPAC Oakland Privacy Advisory Committee
OPD Oakland Police Department
P&J (Berkeley) Peace and Justice Commission
Palantir Company that makes spying and surveillance software
PGP Pretty Good Privacy (Encryption Software)
PRC (Berkeley) Police Review Commission
PRR Public Records Request (local/state)
RAIN Regional Automated Information Network (Oregon) – law enforcement information sharing system
RFP/RFQ Request for Proposal / Request for Qualifications
SARS Suspicious Activity Reporting
SBISS South Bay Information Sharing System – law enforcement information sharing system
SB 1421 A new CA law that took effect Jan 1, 2019 that allows certain police misconduct records to be made public.
SERO Surveillance Equipment Regulation Ordinance
Shotspotter Gunshot detection systems
STAC State Threat Assessment Center
sUAS small Unmanned Aircraft Systems – see UAV
SWAT Special Weapons and Tactics (Team)
Stingray/Hailstorm Cell Site Simulators made by Harris Corp, IMSI catcher
TLO Terrorism Liason Officer – Local cops deputized into JTTF
VPN Virtual Private Network
US-VISIT United States Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology, now called Office of Biometric Identity Management
UASI Urban Areas Security Initiative
UAV Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (aka, a ‘Drone’)
WBISS West Bay Information Sharing System – law enforcement information sharing system