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Internet + Wireless Cameras = Homeland Security
NumberField writes "According to an article by
Steven Levy posted on MSNBC, Jay Walker of PriceLine fame is talking about a
system he calls
US HomeGuard. His plan is to hire large numbers
of unsophisticated users to monitor Internet-connected security cameras looking for
suspicious activity. Although many security details (i.e.,
DOS attacks,
cryptography,
privacy)
need to be handled carefully, it's a weird enough idea that it might actually work..."
RTFA, people. The proposal is to install these cameras along the perimiter of sensitive facilities like power plants, etc. If the camera sees a change from one snapshot to the next, the images get checked by Barney Fife wannabes.
It has nothing to do with watching you in your house, or in your neighbourhood. It has nothing to do with people watching random cameras. I agree that it opens the door wider for 1984ish stuff, but it's not going nearly that far. These are hardly even 'public' places, they are places that the public should not be!
A DOS attack on this system would be interesting. What if a bunch of people coordinated to sneak toward the cameras at a whole bunch of different sites, then run away?
Bitchslapped. Neat.
Protection against unreasonable search is where the right to privacy is derived from, Mostly by the Warren court.
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
RTFA... This system as described only sends video when it detects motion. Then once motion is detected it sends the video to three of these "unsophisticated" viewers. If they see somehting interesting, it is then sent to ten more. If there is agreement that something is worth checking out in the video, then the professionals take over.
As described, this is only useful for moniitoring places where people rarely venture, and really shoulnd't be anyway, such as power substations and bridges in remote areas, etc.
Looks like a pretty good system to me, at first glance.
Send lawyers, guns, and money. Dad, get me out of this.
Workers at these facilities will now ALWAYS be on camera. They were on camera before, but it was just internal security cams. Now, your ugly mug is online, all the time. Yuck.
Joe Q Public, the 'unsophisticated user', will now have the ability (and they will) to check out what Mr. Dam Inspector is doing at any particular time.
MOVEMENT DETECTED!
- Joe, you must evaluate this picture.
--Damn...lookatthat...he's pickin his nose!
MOVEMENT DETECTED!
- Jane, you must evaluate this picture.
--Does that guy look kind of....dark? Yes, we must send this to level 2. (even though its merely the guy who refills the Coke machine)
MOVEMENT DETECTED!
- Alice, you must evaluate this picture
-- ahhh...it's that guy coming back from the bathroom again. Damn, he pees a lot. I think there's something funny going on in there. I think we need to call security.
I know *I* wouldn't want to work in such a place.
It's already been done in Britain, iirc. I remember seeing a short piece on a news program a while back about some poor couple who were living on a city block with a camera mounted on the pole outside. Because of where it was mounted, it had the freedom to turn to look through their windows. The piece was about how they were trying to get whomever had installed the camera to put limiters on it so the people operating the cam would stop peeping on them all the time.
The TIPS program was killed off with the passing of the Homeland Security Act.
This was briefly covered here with a link to a more substantial piece here
Thank god for cooler heads.
Life is not a rehearsal. Step up!
No, a cop shouldn't be able to ask you anything if there is no reason to. I carry a newspaper clipping in my back pocket that proves this point - a man was awarded $6,000.00 (the incident occured the 4th of August, 1997 at 11:30pm) when a cop (Jean-Francois Rivard) stopped the music curator of McGill U (Rejean Mongeau) and asked to see ID, without probable cause, then arrested him when he refused.
Maybe you like living in a police state, but here in Canada, we still have the right to tell the police to "fuck off" when they act illegally. And I do mean, "fuck off". The courts have also held that the police do not have an inherent right to be treated politely when they are overstepping their bounds, and that words like "fuck off" and "shithead" are to be expected in such situations.
If you think this is too extreme, consider what you'd do if someone who wasn't a police officer tried to do the same (detain you without cause).