News | Digital Defense Initiative | Asymmetries and Power

MJ surveillance program allows 55,000 agents to follow “targets” without justification

The Ministry of Justice and Public Security (MJSP) operates and makes available to more than 180 public agencies a powerful data platform capable of monitoring people and vehicles on the streets in real time and without judicial authorization. The MJSP acknowledged to Agência Pública that the 55,000 civilian and military users of the system are not required to explain the reason for choosing their “targets”.

To carry out the monitoring, the surveillance, and control system uses, among other information, images captured in real time by 35,900 cameras spread across public places throughout Brazil: federal highways, urban streets and avenues, entrances and exits of soccer stadiums, among other points. The system also has a feature called “electronic siege”, which in practice can monitor vehicles living on streets and avenues throughout the country by “reading” the characters on their license plates.

Pública found that users of the system can monitor “targets” in real time without explaining the need, who ordered the monitoring, how long it lasted, or the result of the surveillance.

Officially called the Cortex Monitoring Platform by the federal government, the system is used as a tool by the “intelligence” department of the MJSP in Brasília (DF), a condition used as a legal argument for the consultations to take place without prior analysis by the Judiciary, outside of police investigations and legal proceedings.

When asked by Pública, the MJSP acknowledged that “there is no need to motivate the consultation [in Cortex], given that these are consultations aimed at public security activities (which is the purpose of the system). However, if there is suspicion of irregularities in the consultations, the audit should be carried out”.

Although it is the creator, coordinator, and maintainer of the platform, the MJSP told the report that it is not the department’s responsibility to control access to the “targets” consultations by other public agencies that use Cortex.

“Access control for carrying out ‘target’ queries is carried out by the focal point of each institution, indicated by its highest representative, through an official letter, and all queries carried out leave a log of who carried them out, so that auditing is possible”, responded the MJSP.

The ministerial decree regulating the use of Cortex indicates that audits must be carried out by the agencies that have access to the system, with monthly reports on the use of the platform by the 55,000 civilian and military users being sent.

The Ministry of Justice and Public Security (MJSP) operates and makes available to more than 180 government agencies a powerful data platform capable of monitoring people and vehicles on the streets in real time and without judicial authorization. The MJSP acknowledged to Agência Pública that the 55,000 civilian and military users of the system are not required to explain the reason for choosing their “targets”.

To carry out monitoring, the surveillance, and control system uses, among other information, images captured in real time by 35,900 cameras spread across public places throughout Brazil: federal highways, urban streets and avenues, entrances and exits of soccer stadiums, among other points. The system also has a feature called “electronic siege”, which in practice can monitor vehicles living on streets and avenues throughout the country by “reading” the characters on the license plates.

Pública found that users of the system can monitor “targets” in real time without explaining the need, who ordered the monitoring, how long it lasted, or the result of the surveillance.

Officially called the Cortex Monitoring Platform by the federal government, the system is used as a tool by the “intelligence” sector of the MJSP in Brasília (DF), a condition used as a legal argument for the queries to take place without prior analysis by the Judiciary, outside of police investigations and legal proceedings.

When questioned by Pública, the MJSP acknowledged that “there is no need to justify the query [in Cortex], given that these are queries aimed at public security activities (which is the purpose of the system). However, if there is suspicion of irregularities in the queries, an audit should be carried out.”

MJSP says that only 62 audit reports have been registered in the system, which has been in use for over four years. Although it is the creator, coordinator, and maintainer of the platform, MJSP told the press that it is not the ministry’s responsibility to control access to “target” queries by other public agencies that use Córtex.

“Access control for conducting ‘target’ queries is done by the focal point of each institution, indicated by its highest representative, through an official letter, and all queries made leave a log of who performed them, so that auditing is possible,” responded MJSP.

The ministerial ordinance that regulates the use of Córtex indicates that audits must be carried out by the agencies that have access to the system, with monthly reports on the use of the platform by 55 thousand civilian and military users being sent.

However, in response to Pública, MJSP stated that only 62 audit reports have been registered in the system, which has been in use for over four years.

Regarding the low number of these types of documents, considering that there are more than 180 agencies that have been using the system for years, the MJSP argued that it “took upon itself the responsibility of producing audit reports, and all the agency’s audit processes are being reviewed. Therefore, the 62 reports produced were all within the scope of the MJSP”.

“Permanent surveillance process,” says an expert.

Without presenting all the details about the specific case, the report heard experts on the risks inherent in the advancement of a surveillance system as powerful as Córtex.

“Córtex gives us the possibility of subjecting us to a permanent surveillance process, identifying every time you enter and leave a highway or a shopping center, as it is alleged to be capable of doing. In practice, our presumption of innocence is completely ignored”, Rafael Zanatta, director of the Associação Data Privacy Brasil de Pesquisa, specialized in digital rights, told Pública.

“One of the problems with Cortex is that, from the perspective of integration strategy and public safety, it has the appearance of a robust public policy, but its normative part is precarious,” stated Zanatta.

The judge of the Court of Justice of São Paulo (TJSP) Marcelo Semer told Pública in theory, without knowing the specific case, that “the consolidation of a total surveillance project must be viewed with caution, since the unrestricted collection of personal data can generate a situation of absolute compression of privacy and can be used for various purposes, not all of them lawful.”

Semer, who has a PhD in criminology and a master’s degree in criminal law from the University of São Paulo (USP), mentioned a recent investigation by the Federal Police (PF). In 2023, the PF discovered that criminals from the PCC faction used a São Paulo police system to locate an unmarked car belonging to the Civil Police itself.

“Transparency is needed regarding the protocols, even to prevent data that is subject to jurisdictional reservation from being obtained without it or shared with companies for their own purposes,” said the judge.

Surveillance of targets “with or without restrictions”

The Cortex platform receives images generated day and night by 35,900 cameras spread across highways and urban areas, which record entries and exits at soccer stadiums and traffic flow on federal highways, among other places.

Thanks to Cortex’s scheduled alert function, users can mark a specific person or vehicle and be notified in real time if they see or are involved in any activity related to the “target”.

Cortex can monitor people and vehicles “with or without restrictions” 24 hours a day, seven days a week, according to agreements signed by the MJSP with government agencies.

In city halls and states, Cortex is just one of many tools that also have “smart cameras”, that is, cameras capable of “reading” the characters on license plates and monitoring cars and people. A veritable industry has formed around the topic, with private companies assembling and selling the systems to city halls.

In the interior of São Paulo, the company Sentry stands out, which presents itself online as “the true creator of the Electronic Wall”. A program with a similar name, which replicates the Cortex model, is a flagship project of Governor Tarcísio de Freitas in the field of public safety – the so-called Muralha Paulista.

Check out the full article written by Rubens Valente and Caio de Freitas on the Agência Pública website.