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Florida Surveillance Cameras Claim a Victim
kris_lang writes: "The St. Petersburg Times has an article that describes how an innocent man was tracked down because he was used as a "demo" face for Visionics Face-It face recognition software with their on-the-street video surveillance system in Tampa's Ybor City district. The "demo" image was printed in the St. Pete Times, and then sold to U.S. News and World Report which used it in an article. A USN&WR reader in Oklahama misidentified the face as being that of her ex-husband wanted on felony child neglect charges. The Tampa Police tracked him down to his job site and interrogated him. Now here's a question: how did they identify him in the first place to be able to track him down? Well, Florida has also been using digital photos for their newer driver's licenses. So they already have a handy-dandy database to work with."
Actually, he made a joke about a "Tom Cruise missile" (Tom Cruise is one of the more visible members of Scientology, as is John Travolta). The "Church" worked very hard to keep all but very carefully selected phrases of Henson's out of court, removing all context from his comments.
Those who've lived or worked in places with "quote boards" should be well aware of how phrases can sound when taken out of context.
fencepost
just a little off
That's what I want to know. Some random woman sees a picture and says "That's my husband!" Now, IANAL (maybe someday) but it would seem to me this woman should accept some responsiblity for mis-identfing this man. He was harassed wrongfully. What is this woman supposed to do--say "Oops!"? What in the world was this woman thinking?
Lawrence Lessig is my personal hero.
Get a ream or red paper from your local office supply store.
Use your laser printer to print "big brother is watching you from this camera" in bold dark letters. You can also get some clipart of a suveilance camera and print that too.
Take a stapler, some tape, or wallpaper paste and paste this paper right next to (or above or below) any camera you happen to notice. Include ATMS, building security systems etc. Once the sheeple become aware of exactly how closely they are watched they may do something.
War is necrophilia.
For those of us who were too young to have remembered the plot of this excellent movie, quite a bit of the plot revolves around an arrest warrant mistakenly circulated because of a 'bug' in the computer.
Bzzzz....
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Well, in this very article there was a crime across the country and the police bothered this guy, so, yes.
As far as being "swarmed", in a recent case of a Cult of Scientology critic who was prosecuted for humorously threatening their religion with a Tomahawk cruise missile and fled to Canada to seek religious asylum, the CoS turned him in to the police in Canada and he and his wife were arrested by a fully-armed SWAT team in the middle of a crowded parking lot.
I think the situation would have been a whole lot worse for this guy from Florida if his face had matched up with Osama Bin Laden's, or someone like that. It would be real easy for someone to get hurt in situations where the police get very excited very quickly.
Is this worse than just mistaken identity from a "Wanted" poster? Maybe, maybe not. The possible reach of a mistaken identity is a lot farther, since now your photo can be compared everywhere around the country rather than just in your town. The chances of you looking like a criminal in some jurisdiction is higher than the chance that you look like someone in your own town, you know.
And if that weren't enough, I have problems with people assuming that I'm guilty when I go somewhere. A surveillance society assumes that everyone is just waiting to do something wrong. I'm pretty sure that's not the sort of attitude we want to be fostering.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
The officials will call this an accident, the system is so new, this will never happen again, yadda, yadda, yadda. Welcome to 1984, a bit late, but nevertheless my warmest welcome. While this system might be used for good, it also introduces a complete new level of observation which can lead to some pretty funny things. Like employer (official agencies in the first place) research. Oh, Mr. Anderson, you have a second life. During the day you are a computer programmer at xxx and during the night you are known as Neo, Cyberpimp, we cannot hire you for the new job ... and so on, just let your imagination play a little ...
In particular, they took a photo of this guy, published it and sold it without getting a model release. As a direct result of their actions, he ended up if not in trouble with the police at least in the appearance of trouble.
In the USA these days, odds are good that if he sues them (if nothing else, the model release issue gives him legal grounds) he'll get either a significant settlement or a significant award in a trial. In publishing this, I'm sure the SPTimes is hoping to a) keep him from pursuing them and/or b) reduce the amount of sympathy he could get from a jury. It's not a retraction of the earlier story because there's really nothing to retract, but given the nature of the previous story this is about as close as they could get.
Maybe the above marks me as cynical, and I'm sure that's not the only motivation (and it may well not even be a key one - if it was would it be admitted by anyone?), but I'm sure that editorial staff there are aware of it.
fencepost
just a little off
I got one for you:
Getting a ticket for being on a nude beach,
where nobody at all is complaining, can make
you a "Sex Offender", no different in certain
eyes than if you raped their 5 year old daughter.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
I'm noticing a reach-out-and-touch-someone trend here...whether through photographs or 'helpful' virii, why can't I just be left alone? I'm starting to feel like the woman that used to send my company letters about people watching her and having sex on her lawn (including Bill Gates, hmmm...). I think I'll go lock myself in the closet now.
Denver Isuzu Suzuki