What is the advantage of using this app as opposed to using the built-in Voice Memos app and then turning off the phone's screen? Both approaches record audio fine, don't show any immediate indication that recording is happening, and at least with Voice Memos, I don't have an app called "Cop Recorder" running if the police decide to get curious.
>What is the advantage of using this app as opposed to using the built-in Voice Memos app and then turning off the phone's scree
I don't believe there is one. I emailed (CopWatch) a few weeks ago and have not heard anything. One of my suggestions was to change the name.
I know of a person in which a novelty iPhone scale app was used as probable cause to search their vehicle. He is a developer who wanted to see how an iPhone app could act as a scale. Our estimations were correct, vibration and position are used to make a very crude estimate.
The mere existence of this app angered the police and allowed them to justify a full vehicle search, yielding nothing.
A name like CopWatch is a red flag, and I would not want to have an app of that name on my phone if recording secrecy was my end goal.
The app does not upload in real time, but rather works like any other built in app, recording locally, uploading at user instruction, plus needing data entry prior to uploading. Given that we have all seen video of officers destroying recording devices, or recording devices returned broken, it is important to protect that function.
This app in curent form offers no protection against corruption in law enforcement.
My best recommendation is to use UStream. It records locally if there is no cellular or wifi connection. If a data connection can be found, it records directly to the remote servers. You can delete the local file, and even the local representation of the remote server file, but the master will be retained when you login to the webapp. You must only protect your login and password to the webapp, and all recordings made while connected through a data connection should be safe for a sufficient period of time.
I should note, the above suggestions are only tested on iOS devices. I have no idea if they hold true on other mobile platforms. The UStream deletion of local files while retaining remote files could also be a bug, albeit one that has been there for over a year now.
