'Phraselator' Helps LAPD Break Language Barrier
The Phraselator. The name sounds like a joke, something out of a cheesy Sci-Fi movie from the 50's. But despite its kitschy sounding name, the Phraselator has found a home amongst military and law enforcement personnel. The Phraselator is a rugged over-sized PDA with a speaker and a hefty amount of storage for audio. Multi-lingual officers translate and record standard issue police commands, the Miranda rights, and questions in roughly 224 different languages. The device has been found particularly useful in Los Angeles which has a very large immigrant population.
The Phraselator was originally developed with backing from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for use in Afghanistan and Iraq by American soldiers for communicating with locals. The $2,500 device is not a two-way translation system, and is certainly not a perfect communications solution, but having useful phrases pre-translated in a voice searchable device has proven immensely useful. Las Vegas Police are preparing to roll out four of the devices, Florida is using it in correctional facilities, and the Los Angeles Police Department is considering purchasing more.
From Los Angeles Times
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