Dartmouth Fully Encrypting All Police, Fire and Emergency Agency Communications

DARTMOUTH (WBSM) — The Dartmouth Police Department announced that it is now fully encrypting all of its radio communications, along with those of the fire department and other emergency agencies.

According to a release from the department, the full encryption is “to protect sensitive and personal information.”

“This upgrade ensures public safety transmissions remain secure, preventing unauthorized access that could compromise emergency responses, investigations or public safety,” the department said.

In the past, private citizens were able to use scanner technology to listen in on police and emergency communications; modern smartphone apps such as Broadcastify make it easier for anyone to listen in to such communications.

The department noted that the FBI Criminal Justice Information System Security Policy “outlines security requirements, guidelines, and agreements to ensure law enforcement and criminal justice agencies securely handle criminal justice information.”

“This involves safeguarding the transmission, storage, criminal histories and medical information which officers and dispatchers routinely share over the radio,” the department said. “Unlike traditional public broadcasts, encrypted transmissions safeguard this data from real-time exposure and unauthorized rebroadcasts online, ensuring its confidentiality.”

Dartmouth Police Brian P. Levesque noted that the department has been using encrypted communications since at least the 1990s, but through what was known as a “scramble,” which he said made communications “audible but unintelligible.”

Levesque noted that the officers had to manually activate the encryption.

“This distracted officers during demanding situations and occasionally led to accidental unsecured transmissions,” he said. “Adopting full encryption eliminates this burden while ensuring that private information remains private.”

The full encryption will also apply to transmissions from the Dartmouth fire districts, emergency medical services and the town’s emergency management agency.