EVANSVILLE – After a man allegedly ambushed and killed Evansville firefighter Robert F. Doerr II in 2019, investigators said he monitored police radio chatter using a smartphone app as he escaped.
Such a tactic illustrates part of the rationale that law enforcement agencies across the country have used to shroud their radio broadcasts in encryption, blocking public access in an effort to prevent potential criminals from undermining police activity.
J.D. Winkler, deputy chief of the Owensboro, Kentucky, police department, cited these and other reasons earlier this year when Owensboro police and other local first responders handled scanner traffic there in encrypted form.
As more cities consider changing course from the decades-old practice of keeping police, fire and radio traffic open to everyone in real time, the Courier & Press spoke with Evansville’s law enforcement community about whether such a change could take place at a local level.
“There are certainly public safety benefits associated with residents having access to live police radio traffic,” Vanderburgh County Sheriff Noah Robinson said. “It has advantages, but one of the serious disadvantages is that it is difficult for us to react and have an advantage because we are always afraid that the bad guy knows we are coming.
“We’ve seen that before.”
More: Nothing comes out of your scanner? This is why.
The radio system used by the sheriff’s office, Evansville Police Department and fire departments is largely open to the public. Former EPD Chief Billy Bolin, who now serves as chief in nearby Henderson, Kentucky, said the EPD has encrypted channels it can use to discuss sensitive incidents.
But most channels are open, and local watchdog groups publish police and dispatch conversations in real time. Thanks to a 24/7 live stream, anyone with a phone or computer can keep an eye on what’s happening.
Robinson said local law enforcement has discussed whether that could change, but the conversations were brief and no conclusions were reached.
“Only the most preliminary discussions have taken place,” Robinson said. “One thing we discussed was the possibility of going encrypted and then simply deferring radio traffic. In other words: the information is several minutes behind.”
But for now, such a move is only a possibility, and Robinson said there are currently no plans to encrypt Evansville’s main law enforcement radio channels.
Carrie James, director of Evansville-Vanderburgh Central Dispatch, echoed the sheriff’s comments.
“While there has been some discussion, no changes have been made regarding encryption or delaying broadcasts,” she said via email.
Evansville Police Chief Phil Smith did not respond to a call for comment. Sergeant Nick Winsett, meanwhile, told the Courier & Press via text message that the Evansville Police Department’s information technology team “has no plans to block public access.”
Bolin said he believes public access benefits law enforcement and the citizenry. More people submit tips when they quickly learn about possible incidents, Bolin said.
“If you had everything encrypted and it didn’t come out, we would lose that whole element – which solved countless crimes for us,” Bolin told Courier & Press.
He added that the Henderson Police Department currently has no plans to encrypt its radio system.
Arguments about access and transparency
Encrypting radio traffic has become increasingly common in the US over the past year. Hamilton County, Indiana blocked the public from hearing the scanner traffic last July, while Hendricks County now releases fire and police calls with a 15-minute delay.
Larger cities such as Louisville, Chicago and Denver have also encrypted their traffic or plan to do so, the Indy Star reported. In addition to concerns that criminals are tracking and monitoring police movements in real time as they happen, some officials have raised concerns about victims’ personal information being broadcast over the air for all to hear.
That was reportedly part of the reason for the recent decision to block scanner traffic in Owensboro, Kentucky. And there would have been other problems too. Deputy Police Chief J.D. Winkler told the Owensboro Times that he had also heard anecdotally that citizens were making a game of the messages, listening to reports and trying to see if they could be officers on the scene.
In Denver, the move to encrypt radio traffic prompted a backlash from media organizations that used the scanner for breaking news. So in 2021, the Colorado Legislature passed a law requiring law enforcement agencies to establish a “communications access policy” to allow media outlets to bypass encryption and listen through “commercially available radio receivers, scanners, or other viable technology.”
But that required law enforcement agencies and the media to negotiate. And Denver Post editor Lee Ann Colacioppo said the newspaper and police could never reach an agreement.
“As I recall, what they wanted in terms of an agreement was too pushy, so we accepted it,” she told Courier & Press. “It hasn’t made any difference, to be honest.”
Scanner traffic and inaccurate reporting
Media ethicists have long debated the value of reporting unverified police radio reports directly to the public without confirmation that those reports are actually accurate.
In 2013, police temporarily banned public access to police radio channels during investigations into the Boston Marathon bombings after media outlets and Twitter users published unconfirmed and inaccurate reports.
Since then, citizen journalists and watchdog groups have sprung up across the country with the aim of transcribing police radio traffic on social media in real time. The EvansvilleWatch organization has more than 210,000 followers on Facebook, where it reposts police radio posts and public safety incidents.
With a follower base that dwarfs the city’s population, EvansvilleWatch’s posts often generate lengthy public debates — and sometimes arguments — about what a particular report means, and most of the organizations’ posts are sponsored by local businesses.
The proliferation of online scanner feeds, such as Broadcastify, and groups like EvansvilleWatch add further complication to the mix for law enforcement agencies seeking to balance competing interests of transparency, officer safety and privacy.
“There are some real benefits to that, because we can’t possibly message the public as efficiently as (sites) like EvansvilleWatch,” Robinson said. “They’re literally transcribing it in real time. But there are obviously some downsides to that, in terms of maintaining the safety of our officers and deputies and preventing criminals from getting an advantage.”
Robinson was quick to reiterate that local law enforcement agencies see real value in providing the public and media organizations with access to police radio channels and the real-time updates that groups like EvansvilleWatch provide. The question is whether that access should be immediate, he said.
“I think there needs to be a serious conversation about what is the right time,” Robinson said. “How soon is too soon?”
This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: Evansville-Vanderburgh police consider scanner encryption
