Surveillance Society

An Anonymous Coward writes: "According to a Wired story, a company called Pedagog USA wants to have its cameras be as ubiquitious as cell phones and computers, except that the cameras would be spying on the public. These cameras are pretty cheap and easy to install. Scott Fry, of Pedagog USA, appears to think that if they like it in England, it must be loved here!" The story mentions the slow slide in Great Britain when the public became convinced that surveillance would prevent crimes...

Comments

Britain scares me - and I live here!

[Anonymous Coward]

Over the past ten years things have progressed in my home town of Aberdeen, Scotland to the point where, on a quick count of the visible cameras, I am now being filmed by 12 police cameras, 4 traffic cameras and 8 traffic master cameras on a 15 minute drive to work.

Trafficmaster is a company that films you as you drive down busy roads and notes your number plate - it OCRs it I beleive - and waits for you to pass the next camera roughly 2 miles away. It then knows how fast traffic is travelling throughout its network.

The police cameras were first justified in the wake of football violence making the city centre a scary place to be on a saturday afternoon or wednesday night when there was a match on. Since then they have bled out from the 'danger zones' to cover roughly 80% of the streets around the city centre.

Traffic cameras that auto fine speeding cars are probably the least offensive. At least they only grab you if you are actually breaking a law. And speeding kills people - so its a proper crime.

It bugs me that I can't drive to work without all this surveillence. My mobile phone tracks me to the nearest base station, traffic master knows which camera I last passed, and the city centre cameras will even know what I'm wearing.

All this, and the number of attacks on 18-30 year old males is higher now than it was 10 years ago! Attacks on women and the elderly have dropped in the city centre, but have increased elsewhere.

Campaign against the introduction of these things. They are ineffective, costly (I recall that between 2 and 6% of my local taxes are spent on these things every year - depending on how many new ones they install), and offernsive to public liberty.

As acceptance grows people will be open to new ideas, like companies owning the images, in return for operating the network. They are trying to get ID cards introduced across Europe, although publicity is way down on a couple of years back because of electioneering. Add that to the mix and I'll be applying for my green card!

Can we have one small change?

[stripes]

I want the camera images accessible in real time to the public. It has a few advantages:

• It will delay camera deployment for a long time (politicitions don't normally want citizens watching them)
• It will make sure the police are watched
• It will keep cameras out of places the public won't want them (bathrooms, private homes) because the public will see them
• Free entertainment
• More people watching might spot more crimes in real time and end up getting help to them faster
• If only the police watch the cameras, abuses of the police will be dealt with less then if private citizens watch, or at least could have watched
• It's my tax money, why can't I watch?

(I'm not saying I want the cameras, but if we have them, these are my terms)

Re:Cameras Do Prevent Crime.

[anticypher]

From the conclusion of the same report:

...CCTV cameras in Glasgow city centre did not appear to have a major impact on crime... and ...there was no evidence to suggest that the cameras had reduced crime overall in the city centre. (These were taken out of context, go read the report yourself to see a slightly wider context)

Glasgow has been one of the best cities in Britain for combatting its street crime, with more police on the streets, rewards programs, a big push against hard drugs, and more money to aid prosecutions. Glasgow's crime levels have bucked the major trend in the UK for low level street crime, not due to cameras, but because the city council wanted to clean up the image of the city.

camera operators usually focus on minorities or young people in "hostile" outfits

My biggest concerns of camera surveillance are along the lines of operators trained by a mostly white police force saying "Look, he's wearing a Man-U stripe, damn baby rapist, lets track his every move", as well as "track only blacks and asians, because they are the most likely to commit crimes". Since I work in security, I do notice the cameras, and I do have opportunities to observe the operators being biased. It is quite disturbing to watch cameras track you every where you go when you clearly aren't breaking any laws.

the AC

But crime in Britain has skyrocketted

[anticypher]

the slow slide in Great Britain when the public became convinced that surveillance would prevent crimes...

Recently the levels of violent crime in the streets of Britain have acheived record levels. The criminals don't care if there is surveillance video of their actions, successful prosecution requires more than just a grainy video.

Surveillance just allows greater control of the population at large, and will enable even more nefarious actions by various groups (both government and private) at a later date. The /. community is well aware of the dangers of the misuse of technology, but the average public only cares about the perception of security.

the AC

Re:But crime in Britain has skyrocketted

[barracg8]

I used to live in an area in North Wales where a fairly comprehensive network of security cameras were fitted. After one year, the violent crime figures in that area were down something like 40-50% on the previous year.

The kind of conclusion you seem to draw from the national rise in violent crime is not really valid unless you look at the corellation between regional crime figures, and relative numbers of security cameras in the areas.

One interesting note:
Two of the largest news stories in the UK in recent weeks have featured security camera footage as key evidence.

The first is the case of a dutch lorry driver, sentenced to, uh, 15 years, for the murder of 60 chinese imigrants, who suffocated in the back of his lorry, after he closed an air vent. He claimed that he didn't know what cargo he was carrying, and unless this could be proven, he would have got off (unless you can demonstrate that he knew the imigrants were in the back of the truck, then closing the air vent cannot constitute murder). His conviction depended entirely on Dutch CCTV footage showing his buying crates of tomatos that were used as a screen to hide the imigrants, showing that he was involved in loading the lorry.

The second is a trial still running, of a group of professional football players accused gbh on an asian student. Not too much information, since the jury is still out, but apparently key evidence is 12 clips of CCTV footage taken from Leeds city centre camaras.

hell, I don't like them, but as I understand it the results from the CCTV systems are very good.

just my £0.02,
G

Re:But crime in Britain has skyrocketted

[barracg8]

• And the violent crime rate went up something like 40-50% in the unsurveillanced neighbouring areas, right?

Not likely. One of the key problems in the area was to do with violence associated with drunk and dissorderly behaviour late in the evenings after pubs emptied out onto the streets, and as people made their way home. Not the type of problem liable to migrate elsewhere.

In the more general case, you make a fair point, but the kind of problem you describe would not occur if you similtaneously increase CCTV coverage at a reasonably uniform rate everywhere. Obviously, this would make implementation more difficult.

• That's a so fucking typically anglo-saxon "solution"

I'd quite like to hear some explaination/justification for this statement.

G

Re:If it saves one life...

[1010011010]

Has anyone here read The Transparent Society by David Brin? He presents the interesting tactic of demanding "reciprocal transparency." I.e., if the state/a company/a person/etc. demands that you give up some personal information, demand that they do as well.

He covered the idea of ubiquitous cameras in some of his other books -- his version of cheap cameras were called "TruVue."

Essentially, the idea is, i the government gets to spy on you, you get to spy on the government.

He also advocated citizen teams that were given free passes into any area of government, at any time, for six month (or was it week) periods. See and hear whatever you want. Surprise people. Ater all, the government gave itself the authority to do that to you.

- - - - -

Re:No Such Arrangement

[dirk]

Fry suggested multiple applications for mobile video monitoring: Restaurant patrons could dial into their favorite eateries to check who's there and how busy the joint is; transportation agencies could use it to analyze traffic bottlenecks; paramedics could use it in ambulances to beam images of trauma victims to physicians for guidance.
This is an outright violation of privacy by any means. Suppose if I wanted to have a romantic kiss with my wife, should I be subjected to someone watching me? Its my own right to kiss her, and not against the law, and although I wouldn't go public with strong displays of affection, I should retain the right to my privacy. The main street has a direct view to my yard, suppose I had a pool party, should my guests be subjected to the views of a camera misplaced, or placed without my consent for anyone to view the privacy of my own yard?

While I'm not for the cameras, in these cases you don't have any right to expect privacy. If you do something on the street, it is to be assumed someone is watching you. There is no reason someone would not. And yes, this includes cameras. The right to privacy does not include the right to not have people view you in public. And if you can see your pool from the street, then yes, once again, you have no right to expect privacy there. I could stand in the street and personally film you in your pool if I wanted, as long as I did not trespass on your property. To say I couldn't do that would deny me the right to stand on the public ground. The right to privacy only extends to private places. The street is not a private place.

Cameras Do Prevent Crime.

[Carnage4Life]

micheal said:
The story mentions the slow slide in Great Britain when the public became convinced that surveillance would prevent crimes...

We must have read different articles. I looked at the links to Scottish crime statistics in the Wired article and although critical it admits that the incidences of certain crimes have dropped and the loss of life has been prevented on several occassions by the surveillance cameras.

I am opposed to surveillance cameras for a number of reasons chief of which is the one mentioned in the article (camera operators usually focus on minorities or young people in "hostile" outfits) as well as the loss of privacy but even I don't delude myself into thinking that they don't prevent crime.

If you want to oppose to installation of cameras, complain about the potential rights violations or 4th ammendment violations. of course with the growing rise of reality television in the U.S. if there ever was a time that this kind of action would be gotten away with, this is it. Trying to pretend that crime isn't prevented is hiding your head in the sand and won't win you any supporters if the battle against them is fought in the U.S.

I can see it now...

[TheOutlawTorn]

Establishment of the US Dept of Surveillance: 330 million dollars

Installation of 1.7 million CCTV cameras at strategic urban locations: 1.2 billion dollars

Yearly operation and maintenence: 2.9 billion dollars

The look on Congress' face when they realize their system is being systematically destroyed by teenage graffiti taggers with $1.95 spray paint cans:

Priceless

Re:cameras are your friend

[acceleriter]

Do you really think they're going to waste their time getting a group of people to pick out each face in thousands, cross reference it against any files they may have, and write notes on you if you're having a peaceful demonstration?

Since cameras are routinely used for this purpose in the U.S. A Google search on the words "demonstration surveillance camera" will yield numerous reports of this practice. Put yourself in the shoes of the police and politicians. Would you be able to resist the temptation to use this flow of information to keep tabs on your enemies?

No Such Arrangement

[deran9ed]

Fry says it's high time that Americans jumped on the surveillance bandwagon. "They're bloody everywhere in England," Fry said. "It's been working over there and we feel the technology has an application here as well. We're good at what we do and we're going after the markets."

Just by this guy saying it works over there doesn't neccessarily mean its going to work over here, first off this is the vendor saying "it works over there" as if he would say anything to degrade the possibility of getting business out here in the United States. Give me a break.

Fry suggested multiple applications for mobile video monitoring: Restaurant patrons could dial into their favorite eateries to check who's there and how busy the joint is; transportation agencies could use it to analyze traffic bottlenecks; paramedics could use it in ambulances to beam images of trauma victims to physicians for guidance.

This is an outright violation of privacy by any means. Suppose if I wanted to have a romantic kiss with my wife, should I be subjected to someone watching me? Its my own right to kiss her, and not against the law, and although I wouldn't go public with strong displays of affection, I should retain the right to my privacy. The main street has a direct view to my yard, suppose I had a pool party, should my guests be subjected to the views of a camera misplaced, or placed without my consent for anyone to view the privacy of my own yard?

Several studies by Jason Ditton, the director the Scottish Centre for Criminology and one of the few criminologists to research the effectiveness of CCTV, suggest that the cameras have neither the public support nor the crime-reducing power attributed to them.

For such a so called great thing it only seems to be a good thing in the eyes of officials.

And the icing on the cake...

"The cameras were no assistance in stopping the crime, but the images were repeated so often that the average citizen linked cameras to stopping the murder of babies," Davies said. "They believed that if we have enough cameras and the cameras are better, next time we could have stopped this horrible crime. It's a hysteria here."

Nevertheless, in the decade following James' death, the British government has spent an estimated $350 million installing 300,000 cameras around the country, making it the world leader in video surveillance use.

Instead of installing these cameras, they should take any financing for a program such as this, and put it into community centers to assist people in high crime areas. Show them there is more, and show them you are willing to help them change, as opposed to building more prisons, installing cameras all over the place, spending money on weapons and military related garbage.

Better yet here's a solution. Build a steel door in front of the house of every American citizen, then on a timed basis lock everyone in their homes. Will this be a politicians next pitch?

U.S' secret war with Japan

sneakier criminals

[deran9ed]

Now suppose that along every major strip there were cameras everywhere, with the US already with 2% of its own population in jail, the criminal ustice system would be overloaded with criminals.

Lets look at the way the justice system works now, we can say the Rockerfeller laws are a joke that need to seriously be revamped, for one.

Lets have officers arrest people for things that they would normally turn away from at times in big cities per se... Disorderly Conduct, a man and woman arguing, someone horseplaying, someone fixing a flat where their not supposed to. And don't dare say it doesn't happen, recently an 8 year old was arrested for pointing a paper gun and classmate while horseplaying. So don't think the law wouldn't stoop so low to just conduct sweeps for stupid actions, e.g., political race heats up, "Lets use the cameras and go after everyone."

Thats the harsh reality of it all. Those concerned with putting in cameras are not going to monitor who views what, and what should or shouldn't be viewed, and in the fairness of justice someone jaywalking (although not a crime that can do much) should be equally treated as breaking the law as any other law breaker. You can't it a single sided issue.

So if cameras were to go up, try arguing that in a court of law, "Your honor my client was caught on top urinating somewhere, but on the camera you could clearly see the officers turn a blind eye to 30 jaywalkers." Is it fair? No

Now what would happen is, criminals (hardcore) would take greater risks to avoid getting caught which is more likely to signal they'd adapt and perform sneakier, possibly even more dangerous crimes.

George Bush's dirty secret

cameras are your friend

[RobertTheBrute]

Just how much privacy do you expect when you're out and about in public?

As a resident of Glasgow I am delighted to see cameras on every street corner and every road junction. Most of you /. types probably think of Glasgow as a super-scary place with razor-gangs roaming the streets. Well not any more (mostly).

Many people have commented here that "the cameras don't prevent crime", showing a determined effort to neglect their power as a deterrent. Even Glasgow's most neanderthal bampots think twice about mugging Granny McShoogle in Argyle Street when they know they will be forced to watch the action replay on Her Majesty's telly.

We have a program on the telly here (I think it's called "Police, camera, action!"), which shows footage from surveillance cameras of cerebrally challenged criminals performing for our amuesment. Not only is this highly entertaining, it also gets the message across "don't jerk about in a public place unless you have a truly awesome disguise!"

If you want privacy then go somewhere private!
When you're out in public in Glasgow remember, Smile Please!