Smart Sampa Leak Exposed Access to 58,000 Cameras

Access data for São Paulo’s Smart Sampa surveillance network remained exposed on the open internet for about 11 months, according to a report published Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2026. The material reportedly offered a route to live images from more than 58,000 cameras. City hall confirmed a leak, denied a security flaw and blamed one security agent. State prosecutors opened an inquiry.

What the leaked material reportedly exposed

The material reportedly included 181 logins and passwords for authorised users, information on more than 6,000 security agents and instructions for using the system on computers and phones. Reporters used those materials to create an interface that displayed camera images on a city map.

During a test on Oct. 7, reporters saw images of themselves from eight private cameras in Campos Elíseos, a district in central São Paulo. They also accessed images from public locations, including health units and daycare centres. Some credentials reportedly let users enter the technology platform without a second login step. Available tools allowed searches by name, CPF tax number, vehicle plate and incident record.

Rafael Alcadipani, a public-security professor at the Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV), told G1 that a kidnapper could use the system to learn about a target, while a criminal could find out where police cars were. A specialist cited by UOL said some interfaces might let outsiders enter false facial-recognition or number-plate records.

The city said one of more than 7,500 security agents had carried out an illegal act, rather than the incident reflecting a system failure. It said officials identified and suspended the agent, who faced an investigation by the internal affairs office of the Guarda Civil Metropolitana (GCM), the municipal guard. The city said it had taken the data repository offline and that it didn’t contain access passwords, disputing the report’s account of 181 credentials. It said it had added unique passwords, two-factor login and SMS codes for creating new passwords.

City response and prosecutor inquiry

In a written note, the city accused UOL of acting irresponsibly and misleading the public by describing the incident as a security failure. It said no one had improperly used the platform, the municipal audit court oversaw the programme, and the city sent prosecutors a transparency report every six months.

The city also said cameras in public buildings cover common areas, not consulting rooms or care areas. Capturing an image doesn’t mean the system registered or identified a person.

The São Paulo state prosecution service said on Oct. 20 that it would investigate the leak. The case went to its public-property prosecution offices, and officials hadn’t named the prosecutor in charge. The Ministério Público is an independent state body that can investigate public authorities. The inquiry isn’t a finding of wrongdoing by the city or any person.

Contract, costs and programme claims

Sentinelx handles Smart Sampa’s technology platform and joined the Smart City SP consortium, which holds a R$588 million (about US$117 million) contract with the city, Veja reported. Sentinelx replaced Camerite through an amendment signed in January 2026. Veja said the contract makes the contractor responsible for system security and requires it to report abnormal events within 24 hours, with fines for breaches. The report said it found no statement from Sentinelx.

Olhar Digital reported that the city has no access to the facial-recognition source code or artificial-intelligence models and doesn’t independently audit the algorithms. G1 put the programme’s running cost at about R$10 million a month (about US$2 million).

São Paulo launched Smart Sampa in 2024. Its control centre opened in July that year. The centre operates around the clock, drawing images from public and private cameras. Artificial intelligence compares faces with official databases of wanted and missing people and flags stolen or cloned vehicles. The city says the programme has helped capture 3,628 fugitives and locate 284 missing people.

A Centre for Security and Citizenship Studies (CESeC) study, titled “Smart Sampa vigia, mas não protege,” found no statistically significant drop in thefts, robberies or homicides between March 2024 and April 2025. The city disputes that finding. Olhar Digital reported that authorities took 268 people to police stations after facial-recognition alerts between November 2024 and May 2026, then released them. The report said 75 identifications were inconsistent, 181 warrants were outdated and 12 cases involved registration problems.

The leak became an election issue ahead of the Oct. 25 runoff between Flávio Bolsonaro of the Liberal Party (PL) and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the Workers’ Party (PT). Flávio Bolsonaro’s government plan promises a national facial-recognition system inspired by Smart Sampa and the state government’s “Muralha Paulista,” with more than 1 million new cameras, according to plan text cited by Terra. The report said it found no response from the Bolsonaro campaign to the leak.