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It shouldn’t even have an on/off button.

Although I agree with you in general, I think this is for practical reasons. It's not helpful to record 24/7, outside of police operations with regard to battery capacity and limits to bandwidth and data storage.

One could propose a system where recording is triggered automatically when leaving the patrol car (BLE dongle) and can only be reset by a centralized authority.

Recording 24/7 is a simple problem- they turn off when placed on a charging dock in the station. With how microSD is progressing I don't think it's necessary to disable in a patrol car. Perhaps it could somehow communicate with the clock in/out system and only be disabled when the officer is not clocked in to work? Then, lunch would be off the clock and off the camera.

I don't see how it's too different from stores recording their cashiers 24/7.

How about hot swappable batteries with a charger in the patrol car?

Can we actually charge the cam through the officers uniform while he sits at his seat?

That's a (likely problematic and limiting) technical solution to a social problem. Turning it off inappropriately should be subject to review and meaningful action. Any toggle should be near impossible to trigger unintentionally.

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