The Smithsonian Institution Office of Protection Services is the guard force of the Smithsonian Institution. It is a federal guard force consisting of 850 officers with special police authority tasked with protecting visitors, staff, property, and grounds of the federally owned and managed Smithsonian Institution museums and research centers in Washington, D.C., New York City, at the 2,800 acre Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Maryland as well as oversight of the security operations at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama.
