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Hackers Rebel Against Spy Cams
Wired is running an article looking at the little ways in which Austrian technology users are striking back against surveillance. From the article: "Members of the organization worked out a way to intercept the camera images with an inexpensive, 1-GHz satellite receiver. The signal could then be descrambled using hardware designed to enhance copy-protected video as it's transferred from DVD to VHS tape. The Quintessenz activists then began figuring out how to blind the cameras with balloons, lasers and infrared devices. And, just for fun, the group created an anonymous surveillance system that uses face-recognition software to place a black stripe over the eyes of people whose images are recorded."
This is civil disobedience and hacking at its best. Good for them.
Looks like someone can't tell where this is happening. FTA:
BERLIN -- When the Austrian government passed a law this year allowing police to install closed-circuit surveillance cameras in public spaces without a court order, the Austrian civil liberties group Quintessenz vowed to watch the watchers.
Okay, so how is this about "Berlin technology users"? Or am I missing something?
The difference between spam and poop is that you don't have to dig through septic tanks looking for real food. -- Me
This is a scary as the survaliance system is to me. If we do live in a democroacy then the people who put the survalence systems in were elected officials who we have decided are compenant to make improtant decisions. So a vigilante group has decided that they don't like this decision and have taken action themselves instead of organising a grass roots political oposition to the decsion. That is scary. We have as much to fear from vigilante groups of hackers as we do from overzelous goverments. I know I'll get the typical responses pertianing to the failure of democroacy and the lack of properly educated voters in the system, but on sheer principle its still scary. I also suppose that I could throw in a terrible potential if acts of this nature continue, but I think thats obvious and my example would be either too far fetched or too plausible, giving other people with a lower moral standard another idea.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Mr. Skippy,
EYES are one thing. Cameras that record, and software that analyzes are quite another! This combination allows authorities to do all sorts of things that EYES alone cannot, allowing for a much greater potential that this information can be abused.
I suggest you dial your paranoia up a notch. You seem to have entirely too much faith in the system.
Make a hat that has eyes painted on the top, the damn thing can't handle two sets of eyes. Two dots that look like eyes may work too and not get you busted so easy.
Want to know why intersection cameras are everywhere?
If you are going to track someone you need to aquire them first, probably near where they live, then it's easy to follow them from there because they can only go a few ways from there.
Now you know why the cameras are in places where there's hardly any traffic, like near homes way out in the boonies.
The way to get these taken out is to track or let the politicians know that they can be tracked this way, they hate it when we the people can track their bad habits even though they love being able to track ours.
Yes, it is a 'big deal'. Just as with all these vehicle tracking plans...it logs everywhere you go, everything you do, everyone you talk to. And by inference or assumption, what you are doing.
Logged on someones server, forever.
5 years from now, J. Random Asshat, whom you just pissed off by beating him out of a promotion, can, for the price of a case or two of beer, ask his idiot cop buddy for your log. Have fun explaining to your (future) wife that, "No dear, I did NOT have sex with that hooker. I was only asking her for directions."
Everywhere you go, everything you do, everyone you talk to. Forever .
Consider these scenarios:
VonSkippy, I'm afraid we have to decline your application for health insurance. We've monitored your travel habits via public cameras and determined that you spend too much time at your local pub. Furthermore, the records from your grocery-rewards cards indicate you purchase foods that are too high in fats and cholestorol.
VonSkippy, I'm afraid we can't offer you a job. From your the records of the license plate tracking system, we see that you spend a significant amount of time at the republican headquarters. Clearly your political activities are not in alignment with those of this corporation.
VonSkippy, I'm afraid we must deny your application for a home mortgage. From tracking your cellphone travel, we see that you are often speed to work because you are late and are likely to lose your job or die in a traffic accident. We cannot assume that risk.
Get the idea? All public information - all things that the casual observer could see. Do you really want it aggregated so it can be used against you?
It's less an issue of someone, somewhere, knowing where you are at some time. It's more of an issue of the fact of where you are is in a single stream of data all the time.
If it's okay to take pictures of people who run red lights with automatic cameras, then it's okay to keep those cameras on at all time, then it's okay to install new cameras all over, then it's okay to track people and flag them for investigation if they deviate from normal patterns, then it's okay to preemptively arrest them if they display patterns normal to people about to commit a crime... are you ready for the knock on the door at two in the morning, announcing the men who say you need to be detained based on information only they can have access to? You might think this is overly paranoid, nothing like this could actually happen. You might also be a fool.
Something else: this information is obviously insecure. If you're okay with the government knowing all this, are you okay with the local criminal organization(s) knowing all of this? Do you think it's actually possible to perfectly secure any data?
(by the way, whoever modded parent flamebait is a jerk)
"Quoting yourself is stupid." -Me
But they aren't physically covering features. It's basically a joke or an artistic statement, depending on how you look at it. They are taking footage from their cameras with the face revealed, and digitally covering the faces with the black stripe. It's a philosophical comment, not a technological one.
... and then they built the supercollider.
Nod, his point was that enforcement of the law was selective. If he wears a costume and wanders around, the police come a running. But their constant surveillance was not deterring actual crime. The police were choosing which laws to enforce and enforcing social norms instead. Or just gawking at the 'interesting' disturbances.
Don't get me wrong. It wasn't the hackers that failed to impress me. Good ingenuity on their part.
It was the security system that the Austrian people probably spent a few hundred thousand tax dollar-equivalents on.
The cameras they are protesting is police surveillance cameras, hidden in a public place to monitor the activities of "suspects". They are locating the general area with signal monitors, then tapping into the picture to get an exact fix. So it is significant.
Now comes the moral question. These cameras seem to be the legal equivalent of a "police stakeout" without the suspicious looking van. Disseminating information on how to locate them is roughly equivalent to spray painting "surveillance van" on all the police vehicles, putting black bars on the faces is perhaps more equivalent to standing infront of the van to block their view. Which brings up the moral questions, and doesn't seem to be useful in accomplishing the hackers claimed goals:
A simple media campaign would be far more effective.
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.