NEWS The lack of data-friendly handsets for the police's £2.9bn Tetra digital radio system means officers will need to use Bluetooth to connect portable devices such as PDAs and tablet PCs to their network.
O2 Airwave is running the PFI contract, which has been dogged by controversy over the safety of handsets and masts, as well as criticisms that the network will be obsolete by the time it is fully rolled out.
To date, 35 police forces have signed up Airwave and a nationwide rollout is due to be finished by the middle of next year. The fire and ambulance services are currently evaluating bids for their own digital radio network but the government has again delayed a decision on the choice of supplier.
Roger Marsden, mobile data programme director at Airwave, told silicon.com that data transmission was not a key feature of the project when it was first raised back in the late 1990s but he said moves are being made to offer new data services and improve access.
While existing Tetra handsets are fine for voice communications, the displays are too small for accessing and inputting data, and Marsden said Bluetooth will instead allow forces to use whichever non-proprietary portable device they want in conjunction with the basic Tetra handsets.
"Using Tetra portable radios officers can do some of the checks with PNC (police national computer) but the user interface is very small and not user-friendly. The market doesn't provide any Tetra-based PDA devices or modem cards," he said. "Bluetooth opens them up to the whole plethora of consumer devices – iPaqs, tablet PCs – wirelessly over a Bluetooth link."
He dismissed the possible security weaknesses of transmitting sensitive police information from a Tetra handset to a PDA via Bluetooth and said Airwave has developed a secure Bluetooth link that is set to be formally approved by the government this summer.
The use of Bluetooth with portable devices in addition to Tetra handsets means forces will have to fork out for more kit but Marston said police forces have indicated they prefer a choice of different devices for various situations.
"They don't see it as an extra cost. Bluetooth is not just a short-term fix. The market does want access to the whole choice of consumer devices. We are also looking at a Tetra modem card and the third option is a Tetra device."
Data transmission speeds, however, remain an issue with the Tetra network only capable of speeds of around 3Kbps. Some forces are already running GPRS alongside Airwave for some data-intensive tasks but Airwave hopes its Mobile Application Gateway (MAG) developed with Siemens will boost data capacity.
The MAG is a GPRS-enabled portal providing access to data services; Lancashire, one of the earliest Airwave adopters, is due to begin trialling it in Preston this week. Around 25 officers will be given O2 XDAs to access wider PNC checks and missing persons systems over GPRS.
Comments
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1. Ian Savell
Typical public sector procurement. Fixed, inadequate specification, late delivery, expensive infrastructure, no competition. Why aren't the coppers carrying GPRS mobiles or even 3G? No infrastructure cost, multiple competing suppliers, cheap, effective and latest technology. The emergency services hook might just get local camapigners to allow a few more masts in urban areas, too.
Don't you just despair at how much of our tax contribution goes onto rubbish like this?
2. anonymous
Non-secure Bluetooth, used for transmitting intelligence material? I sincerely hope this is less open to snooping and 'Bluesnarfing', than mobile phones. The Sunday Times recently hired a security expert to hack into various mobile phones using Bluetooth, in the lobby of the House of Commons. What's to stop people accessing police data in this manner?
3. Nick Hunn
The security issue the Sunday Times highlighted was a result of an incorrect implemetation of the Bluetooth standard on a limited number of GSM handsets, where data stored within the handset could be accessed. The planned police usage is with Tetra handsets, which have not been shown to contain this flaw. Given that manufacturers are aware of the mistakes they made these new handsets should be secure. In addition the data flow from handset to PDA or peripheral is encrypted. Still it might be best to train the bobbies to be suspicious of hackers following them around with empty pringles tubes. Maybe pointing a crisp packet at a transmitting officer should be added to the list of terrorist offences.
For more information on the risks and reality of Bluetooth hacking, there's a white paper at www.tdksystems.com
4. Adam Laurie
The article states that forces can "use whichever non-proprietary portable device they want", which means, presumably, they will be encouraged to do so. Developing your own application for the secure transmission of data over bluetooth doesn't protect you from compromise of the device itself via other channels, so doesn't really get you anywhere, and I find it highly unlikely that they have developed a system that guarantees security of all bluetooth enabled PDAs, or, indeed, an application that even runs on "whichever non-proprietary portable device they want".