Slashdot Mirror
Spy Drones Take to the Sky in the UK
Novotny writes to tell us The Guardian is reporting that the UK's has launched a new breed of police 'spy drone'. Originally used in military applications, these drones are being put into use as a senior police officer warns the surveillance society in the UK is eroding civil liberties. In the UK, there are an estimated 4.2 million surveillance cameras already, and you are on average photographed 300 times a day going about your business. Is there any evidence to suggest that this increasingly Orwellian society is actually any safer?"
You're telling me that technologies once developed by the military and/or used for military applications have started being used for other applications as they become more affordable, manageable, and available.
And that governments, law enforcement entities, and municipalities have increasing access to and leverage technologies to become more effective at the jobs with which they are charged by the public?
O, the humanity.
I mean really, does anyone think that making people safer is the actual purpose of these programs? I know, I know, never ascribe to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity, but millions of cameras, everyone photographed hundreds of times a day... Come on, who can believe that is about anything but control of society.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
FTFA:
"However, senior officers in Merseyside, who are trialling the drone, said they did not believe it was the next phase in creating a Big Brother society.
"Assistant chief constable Simon Byrne said: "People clamour for the feeling of safety which cameras give."
This is such a beautiful use of the English language that I can't help but admire it.
The people who have already been brainwashed into believing that a surveillance society is a safe society will have their warm feelings of safety reinforced by this statement, even though in no logical way can it be conceived to be a statement that it will actually make anyone safer.
The people who have not are the only ones who will read between the lines.
Thus this is a brilliant way to say something to the media without actually saying anything, and what's more, without compromising their goal of having a camera covering every square inch of the nation. The media goes away happy with a sound bite, the sheeple go away happy after listening to the sound bite, and life progresses as "normal". Which is to say, straight down the toilet.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
> Is there any evidence to suggest that this increasingly Orwellian society is actually any safer?
Have you heard of any rampaging Jew attacks in London lately? No? I thought not.
Carry on.
"ENGLAND PREVAILS!" (V for Vendetta in case you're curious...)
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
To say... I pity you guys/gals in England. And I thought we had a police state here in the United States. At least we keep ours under differing names (TIA/ONI/DCS1000+2000+3000+4000) and flush the minds of the people with news on Bratney, Lindsay, Paris, etc. to keep them dumb. You guys get no break.
Infiltrated dot Net
What's scary is the apparent passivity among the denizens of UK regarding this. I have not read anything about a mass protest, organized groups to put in elected officials opposed to this, etc. Seems the majority of the people over there are resigned to this type of watching. Shows that it will probably happen over here too as well as we copy from the Brits.
I suddenly felt as though Half Life 2 could one day be a possible future, whirling observer bots and all!
Note that being photgraphed 300 times per day amounts to being within range of a security camera for ~12 seconds (camera at ~25fps).
Seeing as it could take about that time to walk past a camera, it doesn't sound like very much surveilance at all.
Big Brother is watching you.
Not very exciting but the Beeb has a video here
wot no sig
Who is it making it safer for?
It seems any safety increase s dubious at best. I know for a fact it would not make me feel safer, it would give me that creepy feeling, the Bugs Bunny "Ever got the feeling yous was being... watched?" (minus the looney part of it) feeling.
I think there should seriously be a council or something that actually looks into whether technologies that are slated for implementation will actually have the desired effect, or if it is not true.
If you believe in privacy, and believe you have "nothing to hide" at the same time, you're a goddammed idiot
What would be cool is to have it loaded up with a laser. Then when some thugs are kicking the crap out of someone or robbing them, send it after them. Zap, zap... would be cool to see that. And when they run out of CCD range, this thing could follow them.
But unfortunately, like anything else there are good ways to use technology, and there are bad ones. I could also see it carry a nerve gas agent for crowd control on a protest of an unpopular government move.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
But are they pilotless drones?
Read anything by Theodore Dalrymple - he's published in "City Journal", and has a number of books out (e.g., "Life at the Bottom").
His observation is that dysfunction grows to consume all the money made available to combat it. Filming people isn't going to fix anything. Holding them accountable will.
Oh and also, the last time I was in the UK, I was struck by all the kids wearing hoodies.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
everyone photographed hundreds of times a day
What they didn't mention is that with all those video cameras each frame counts as an individual photograph, so standing in view of a 30fps camera for 4 seconds counts as 120 individual photographs. Not as scary once you do the math.
If you are about to mod me down, keep in mind that this post was most likely sarcastic.
...are comfortable being led. Welcome to City 17.
My humor is probably your flamebait
Sounds like city 17 is becoming a reality.... flying drone cameras, and after that drones with blades that fly around "saving" the public.
"we've got trenchcoats and bad attitudes" - John Constantine, HellBlazer
Yeah, law enforcement aren't looking for ways to better do their jobs...it's all about a much higher level plot - one that might not even be known by the front line or even higher ranking police officials - to "control society".
;-)
And I know the connotation in which you meant that, but that's exactly what law enforcement is, in case you hadn't noticed: the control of society.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau explained in the 1762 The Social Contract Or Principles Of Political Right that "laws" are "the rules the members of a society create to balance the right of the individual to self-determination with the needs of society as a whole". Laws are "rules that mandate or prohibit certain behavior in society."
Since law enforcement is mandated to do what its name implies, is it any surprise that tools, whether they be telephones, computers, the internet, databases, night vision optical equipment, cameras, planes, helicopters, cars, trucks, weapons, office buildings, recording devices, radios, and so on are all adopted by this community?
Technology is a force multiplier for law enforcement just as it is for the general populace or an individual. No, a group of citizens is not likely to operate drone aircraft. Nor are they likely to maintain vehicle fleets or any manner of other things accepted for the execution of law enforcement.
Come on, spun.
Any safer? Who knows! If it contributed to preventing the 7/7 train bombings would you say it was?
The camera was in action near where I live today. The BBC got it on camera: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/6676 809.stm - you need to click 'watch' on the right hand side.
The obvious Ben Franklin quotation comes to mind:
"Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither liberty nor security"
That really sums up what's happening on both sides of the ocean. While I disagree that this is (solely) a sinister plot of an overweening government to control of its populace, this seems as often as not to be the end effect in scenarios like this. People are smart individually, but in scared groups they often make terrible decisions, which is why there's a lot of sheepish head-scratching on Capitol Hill here in the States about the fervent support that was given on both sides of the aisle for the Iraq debacle. The scariest thing about the current group of leaders is that they don't seem to have read their history properly.
u-bend
You know you feel safe when the camera can see you, should you be attacked then help is on it's way... but then the more I thought about it the more I became concerned.
I know the old arguement of 'if you've done nothing wrong, you've nothing to hide' but who defines what is wrong? Howmany commuters would like the police to know how fast and on what road your were driving? I wouldn't, I speed because it is not that dangerous (92% of accidents in the UK are NOT deu to excess speed, yet this warrents thousands of speed cameras). CCTV everywhere smacks of the former soviet union and East Germany befor the wall came down, this is not what the Constitution of the UK is about.
Kind of glad I moved state side!
In the not too distant future, next Sunday A.D.
I guess V for Vendetta is getting a bit closer to real life now.
Cannot find REALITY.SYS. Universe halted.
What crap. Do you think Orwell had to deal with the crime rate of today's age. NO.
We have big problems here in the U.S.
We need cameras and need build fences and walls around crime zones and ID tags for everyone.
If it brings crime down then it's all good.
Is there any evidence to suggest that this increasingly Orwellian society is actually any safer?
The UK is adding laws requiring compulsory reporting of people who might be criminals.
It really is falling into order, comrade. This is doubleplusungood.
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
There are two directions in human government - complete anarchy which is unachieveable, we only have governance even among friends, and complete control of human lives - which has also been unachieveable. The USSR did not have a drug problem, or a crime problem in general because of totalitarian control, the US and other countries with less control do have a greater crime problem. Our crime can be attributed to a number of things, such as lack of cohesion with the number of clashing cultures in our country, but the crime, caused by whatever roots, is allowed by less control, by our pendulum being closer to the left (lack of control vs. control, not Demo vs. Repub). This mass tracking of citizens moves the pendulum to the right, giving the government more control. Yes, this will bring more safety but at the cost of freedom. I do not judge a new initiative or action by governments on whether or not it gives safety, but by whether or not it promotes the level of freedom that is right, and our differences of our view of the correct level we'll have to work out (democracy and republicanism).
"Where have all the good people gone?" - Jack Johnson
The police have even learnt a good trick to assault you based on these cameras. I had one WPC ask me what was going on after a disturbance that I was not part of. I explained. She said 'pardon?'. So, naturally, I lean in a bit closer so she can hear. Wham ! She lays into me. On camera, it looks like I'm about to attack her by leaning in. *sigh*.
Cameras are solely in the UK to allow police to avoid doing real police work and provide a deterring presence, and to allow them to employ nefarious tactics against the criminal public. Don't ever be under the illusion that they are there for you, the taxpayer.
"I am not bound to please thee with my answers" [William Shakespeare]
We never voted for those cameras in the UK, they were installed by default, without public agreement.
... you'd be begging for being tagged with a label of "terrorist" or "anarchist" here, favourite words of those in Parliament, and of course happily supported by the media.
... it'll be branded "terrorist action", guaranteed.
All the major UK parties have "Law and Order" as a plank of their manifestos, so it's not as if we ever had a choice of any kind that would allow even an implicit anti-surveillance vote to be made. What's more, not voting at all will always return one of these parties to power given the way that the voting system is rigged, so democracy is really just a figment of the imagination here in that respect.
And just try challanging it
I'm not sure where all this is leading, but a civil war in a few decades' time wouldn't surprise me at all. It won't be labelled as civil unrest though
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
I personally will be giving them a whack with my crowbar when they come near me.
The US is also a democracy but I have one word for you... Iraq. Think about it.
9/11 didn't happen to them. If only we'd had more cameras!
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
I think that what happens now in the UK and might soon become normal among other Western nations could be predicted quite a while ago. Look, now that the most powerful enemy of the West is no more, and the Western countries control pretty much of the rest of the world [think colonies], what would be the next logical step for a Western power such as Britain? Right, establish control on its own population.
In all fairness this drone will be less noisy than the sometimes nightly drone of police helicopters. Being kept awake for a week by circling helicopters because of kids joyriding is something I can do with scratching off my "Why the fuck am I still living in this shithole country" list.
but then I became a pr0n star....
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
True democracies don't do well because the masses are idiots and politicians pray on said idiots. After all in a democracy it only matters that 51% support something while the rest can go screw themselves (or revolt more likely).
Can anyone give me a real reason for NOT having cameras in public places instead of screaming "Orwellian" or "1984" all the time?
Jonathanjk.com
The sheeple outnumber me. Who am I to tell them what they should want?
It sucks that what the majority wants is different than what I want. Perhaps what I want is right, and what they want is wrong. Perhaps the whole universe is broken because of this. Perhaps my rants are the most justified rants in all of recorded history. But it doesn't matter.
I am outvoted.
I don't want a maximally efficient government. I like the fact that no one can push a button, and find out what I have eaten in the last two weeks.
If I'm in a Western Democracy that is reasonably well-off and free-market oriented, I like my government to be small, with little insight into what I'm doing or how I'm doing it. As a matter of fact, I'd like my government to be on permanent vacation, and only convene during emergencies. Law enforcement can be efficient and on the job, but should not make me do its surveillance job, nor should it rely on technology to do the peacekeeping (which includes rounds on foot).
That's my creed, and I'm sticking to it. I just wish there were a party for me.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
In a more recent study, it seemed to help deter crime. A review (Welsh & Farrington 2006) of high quality evaluations of the effectiveness of CCTV as a crime prevention measure concluded that there was an overall eight percent reduction in crime in the experimental areas where CCTV was installed compared with a nine percent increase in crime in the control areas. The review included evaluations of 19 sites in the UK and the USA. Other findings from this meta-analysis concluded that CCTV interventions were more successful in car parks than in other settings such as city centres or housing estates, and that CCTV interventions were generally more successful in the UK than in the USA.
In the 7 minute walk from home to the tube station down the road, I've counted about 20 cameras that I walk through. So thats already 40 caputures a day accounted for in just 14 minutes of my daily life.
I live in London, where there are probably more cameras than most cities, but I certainly find the number of camera alarming and unsettling - it's never clear who runs the cameras, for what purpose and where the data ends up and for how long. I've also seen some pretty bad behaviour in front of CCTV cameras; I always think that if I were attacked, the grainy CCTV pictures shown on Crime Watch or in the paper would be of little comfort.
Well, this is the UK we're talking about, so that would be a 25fps camera, hence only 100 photographs....
www.wavefront-av.com
If you haven't RTFA, do so.
It's a beautiful bit of self-contradiction. The best bit is:
The spy plane was launched as a senior police officer warned the surveillance society in the UK is eroding civil liberties.
Well, nobody's forcing you to deploy these, Mr. Senior Police Officer.
Why would you have mass-protests for police entities procuring increasingly more technologically sophisticated equipment to do their jobs more effectively? In any society, whether it is free or not, I fail to see how this is surprising. And in a free (or quasi-free, or however you want to frame it) society, I fail to see how this is surprising, or even wrong.
Telephones make the job of law enforcement easier. Should we protest or prohibit their use of telephones?
Computers make the job of law enforcement easier. Should we protest or prohibit their use of computers?
Vehicles make the job of law enforcement easier. Should we protest or prohibit their use of vehicles?
Helicopters make the job of law enforcement easier. Should we protest or prohibit their use of helicopters?
Remote controlled robots make the job of law enforcement easier. Should we protest or prohibit their use of remote controlled robots?
It's not about the tools; it's about the laws that govern their use. Why is a drone a problem? Cameras in public spaces? Because it makes law enforcement "too" aware? I'll accept that argument, but you'll have to make it a cogent and relevant one...
Woo, so the UK police are using unmanned choppers to spy on me, is that like the manned choppers also fitted with cameras which buzz my area every Friday & Saturday night? Once again I'll ask anyone complaining about civil liberties - what exactly is being lost here? I would imagine that it's not for peering into homes, there would be much rumpus if the police did try to use such evidence in court (I've never heard of it), and if that's really such a worry, well, close your curtains. And remember that people could also peer into your house from the ground.
http://www.blackwaterusa.com/airship/
Coming soon to a police state near you.
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
In public, you have no right to privacy.
I'd be ticked if they were putting cameras in people's homes without a warrant related to a specific investigation. But seriously, what you do in public is *public*. Hellooo.
I dunno why people feel they have an inherent right to privacy on a public street. I think that governments have every right to put cameras out in public places if they so choose.
And yes, I do think this is about making the public safer. Tracking criminals and terrorists so that they can't as easily get away from law enforcement. Providing documentary evidence of crimes committed in public spaces instead of relying on unreliable eye-witness testimony, so that prosecutions can be obtained and criminals sent to jail instead of back on the street committing more crimes.
We've already seen, in society, how putting cameras in banks and stores has helped to identify and convict criminals. It's hard to tell a court that you didn't do it when they've got you on camera shooting the clerk in the face with your gun and grabbing the money out of the cash register. This is an extension of that.
Cameras might not prevent crimes, directly. But getting an arrest and a conviction can prevent future crimes by the same person.
What is law really for, who does it really protect, and who pays the cost? I'm sure you know the quote, "The law, in it's majestic fairness, forbids the rich as well as the poor from sleeping under a bridge." The law exists to serve the rich. A stable society serves the status quo. Property laws do not help those who own no property.
I'm not blaming law enforcement. It's the wealthy that are implementing these policies, law enforcement are only trying to do their job, just as you say. Their job is to protect the rights of the rich, and incidentally (and only so long as it also serves the interests of the rich), the rest of us.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
We never voted for those cameras in the UK
They might not have done round your way, but they do round here. We lose votes every time we don't install enough new cameras fast enough in my council.
... is how to arrange that one of these things doesn't fly into me??
I'm not worried about police choppers, because they're big enough to see, and they have a pilot on board who is just as keen on staying alive as I am (and on a really good day ATC will tell me where they are, although one doesn't want to rely on that).
But toy planes, being flown around by someone safely on the ground who probably doesn't even have a pilot's licence?? Have they even passed the Air Law exam??
All I have to say is once these hit the U.S., I'm out of here.
I was in London a while back, and the cameras in the underground stations did make me feel safer. Other than that, I did not really notice the cameras. There is nothing I really do out in public that I care whether I am being filmed or not. But if somebody tries to mug me, breaks into my car, causes an auto accident, etc..., then the cameras would come in handy.
I know a lot of slashdotters seem paranoid about this kind of stuff, but the truth is if the government/police/"the man" wants to screw you over, he doesn't need an elaborate camera system. It is a lot easier just to fabricate charges or plant evidence or whatever. If the powers that be want to screw you, then you are pretty much screwed.
True, but UK cameras have more horizontal lines. So these photographs would be of a better quality.
Whoa, who modded me informative, I was just being sarcastic and trying to spark some debate into how the number of photographs or times a camera sees you can be accurately quantified. What does "300 photographs" mean? Walk past 300 individual running video cameras or actually get your photo snapped 300 times? Can you be accurately identified from each of these "photographs"?
It's ok though, all the moderaters have to do is mod my last comment up +5 funny, and then this one +5 informative. Yes I get oodles of karma but it's the integrity of the discussion on slashdot that matters.
If you are about to mod me down, keep in mind that this post was most likely sarcastic.
Let's put a few things in perspective.
a.) outside of society there is chaos. society, as in social liberties, freedom pursuit of happiness did not evolve until some people decided we need to put in controls.
b.) those who are most active (not verbally) in society generally are the ones who impact society and said controls more. So stop acting like this is a new thing its just new technology. Once it was the census, then finger printing. Its just a new technology that is doing what we have always done enforce those controls that keep us from anarchy.
So all that being said instead of crying fowl just because people are using cameras how about getting from around your computer and start doing something active to play apart in how this new technology is used to enforce those controls. Shouting wolf only encourages panic.
What they didn't mention is that with all those video cameras each frame counts as an individual photograph, so standing in view of a 30fps camera for 4 seconds counts as 120 individual photographs. Not as scary once you do the math.
Err, no. With, on average, one camera per 14 people (and far, far more in the big cities), it is more like "everyone caught on camera hundreds of times per day"
"She's furniture with a pulse"
I have to wonder what happens to areas out of camera shot. Anyone looking to involve themselves in law-breaking would simply need to do so where the lens isn't aimed. Sounds like motivation to re-locate to me, nothing more. Further... Who do you think decides where to aim the lenses, no chance for bias there... right?
Seriously, is it supposed to look like that?
In the UK it seems the majority of people favor the high saturation of security cameras. So even if there were a vote there would still be cameras everywhere. What you guys need is some huge scandal involving the police abusing the system for the political gain of someone or through some other type of corruption. I'm sure papers like The Guardian would pick up on it and people would start to change their views on this. Then again there have been proven, systematic abuses of the Patriot Act by the FBI here in the US and most people don't seem to be too concerned about it (but we don't have The Guardian and like papers either). The abuses haven't lead to anyone being sent to jail as far as I've read which may be part of the reason it isn't on most people's radar.
I appreciate your healthy cynicism, but a stable society benefits all members. You argue, with some success, that the "rich" are somehow better protected or afforded more rights, but that is more a function of the fact that their possessions themselves often afford them a better lot in life notwithstanding specific "law" that that effect.
I think you're making connections that are a little too tenuous. If lawmakers are generally "wealthy" (in comparison with the rest of the population), then, sure, it's a true statement that the "wealthy" are implementing these policies. But it's not because they're wealthy. And this notion that there is a silent plot by the "wealthy" to constantly control the "sheep" of society via any means they can - such as drone aircraft used by law enforcement - is a little too much of a stretch for me, and for most people.
Yes, there are people with power and wealth who want to protect what they have. Society will be friendlier to the "rich" because everything is by nature "friendlier" for the rich. But it's not as direct a plot as you imagine by the ultra-rich to "control" society to their own benefit. That a stable societal structure benefits the "rich" is incidental, not causative. I won't disagree that the rich have things easier. But unless you believe in punishing the rich or in true communist/socialist ideals, wealth redistribution, and so on, I don't see how that reality will - or even should - change.
People are sheep; they do not care if they are filmed every yard of the walk to work. The illusion of security is far more powerful than the need for freedom. But just wait until there is a real "thought police"; the soviet union managed for a while, but the censorship and punishment of people who vented frustration with the system, torrented a massive dislike for the system. I do not think people right now feel that they need their civil liberties, but that time may come. Given the very complicated electoral process, it may be very hard to get a member of parliment willing to sacrifice his relationship with the ministry of internal affairs for a "not existing problem" (in the public opinion). So I would expect this to keep on going more and more until the police actually targets "thoughtcrime" perpetrators.
The new last night covered a story about American Spy Planes flying over Norther California and Silicon Valley. The military said that they're just running tests. I don't believe them. Seems like for all the attention the UK is getting about this, here in the US we're getting the same treatment. Seems Orwell was off by about two and half decades.
- I voted for Nintendo and against Bush
Have you heard of any rampaging Jew attacks in London lately? No? I thought not.
Have you heard of any rampaging Muslim attacks in London lately?
Oh wait. Yes, you have.
Carry on.
i would like to submit that, with surveillance technology, we are experiencing the sort of evolution of a price point where they get so cheap, people will just plaster recording devices everywhere. i mean i can go into home depot and equip ever corner of my house, inside and outside, with cameras and recording hard drives that just a decade ago would have cost 100x as much. and they are only getting cheaper
for good? for bad? who knows, but i do believe that the era of humanity where you could go about your business in cities (and soon the countryside i bet) and be anonymous except for human witnesses is fast disappearing, perhaps forever, perhaps inexorably so. and i think it's inevitable- i didn't say it was good, but i think there's no going back
this evolution will change society. but i would also like to submit that everyone always focuses on the government putting more cameras up, a la orwell, and it is the case that governments are all to happy to stick recording devices everywhere, but there is arms race going on in reverse... and in perpendicular
what i mean is, witness rodney king and other examples of citizens with cameras. that "little brother" is just as much an issue as "big brother", that citizens are watching the government just as much as governments are watching citizens. and there was a case here in new york ctiy recently of a flasher on the subway who was caught on the cellphone of one of his victims. that's what i mean by "perpendicular": forget about the government for a moment watching you, what does it mean for society where everyone has a cellphone camera and can start recording what's going on around them at a moment's notice?
so the issue with cameras is not so much that the fbi or the nypd is watching you, but also that:
1. people are watching the government right back (rodney king)
2. your fellow citizens are watching you, and you are watching them (ie, the tyranny of the crowd is just as much as an issue as the tyranny of the government.. such as with the subway flasher example)
folks, it's some interesting evolutionary dynamics in human society going on with cheaper and cheaper eavesdropping tech. and i think the way things are going to play out are not going to be like 1984 at all, but something perhaps a lot weirder. it's an arms race
so i think we need to retire the 1984 references, and lose the obsession with an intrusive government... because we can intrude right back, and it may be your fellow citizen who is more of a "tyranny" of eavesdropping than the government anyways. what's the proper way to think about this issue? i don't know, but it is weirder and more complex than the stereotypical orwellian ideas on the subject
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
In the UK, there are an estimated 4.2 million surveillance cameras already, and you are on average photographed 300 times a day going about your business.
1. While the claim about the total number of surveillance cameras might be close to the truth, what this kind of blanket statement doesn't tell you is where those cameras are.
The vast majority of them will be in private spaces, like shops, bars, and restaurants, where owners are primarily concerned about minor crime like theft. Then there will be a fair proportion in public spaces where crowd control and security are an issue, like tube stations and airports. And, of course, municipal buildings, such as courts, police stations and hospitals will have a chunk of cameras, too.
I'd estimate that over 80 percent of those cameras are accounted for right there. Many of them aren't recording an image more often than once every few seconds. Many will be decoys that aren't recording at all. Many are black and white. Many are of very low quality. The overwhelming majority won't be user-operated in any way or have any archived long-term storage. None of them will be networked in any meaningful way that would let anybody track you in real-time over more than a few hundred yards.
2. The idea that you'd be photographed 300 times in an average day is complete rubbish. If you woke up, got on a bus, caught a tube train, changed at a busy station, got to work, visited several shops at lunchtime, went back to work, spent a few hours socialising in a couple of places and then went home, then, perhaps, I can see you possibly passing a camera around 100 times. The likelyhood of your picture actually being taken every time? Less than the likelyhood of you winning the lottery, I'd bet.
Don't forget, one way or another, Britain has been a victim of violent terrorism for at least two generations. First there was Irish republicans, now there's Islamic extremists. The former didn't much like having their pictures taken, so cameras were an effective deterrent before the fact, as well as a vital detective tool after it. The latter aren't so easily deterred but cameras have still been of limited use in going over their attacks.
If you want proof of how "effective" CCTV is in the UK, just look at the 7th July attacks in London a couple of years back. Although they were travelling by pulic transport and their identities were known after the fact, police were able to piece together only a few shots of the attackers, all from one camera, I believe. Their whereabouts and what they did once they reached London, even though they travelled by public transport, and virtually unknown. Bottom line: in a "pull out all the stops" exercise, four people were totally lost in the crowd.
The camera footage of the attempted attacks a fortnight later weren't much better and the perpetrators were able to escape untracked through London. If these CCTV cameras were half as effective as people want to make out, then police would have been knocking on the perps' doors hours if not minutes after they escaped. The reality of the situation is different, and anybody who thinks otherwise is, frankly, an idiot.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Is this about fighting "crime" ? or identifying "anti-social behaviour" ?
Seems like it's none of the polices business if I don't like talking to people, no? Or is this just some language barrier thing between the US and UK English?
-w
calling all destroyers
not to worry, you only get labeled as a terrorist if you lose. If you win you're a "patriot" and "founding father" and get to write the history books.
Many cctv cameras run between 5 and 15 fps and are stored in quarter frame formats, so you are all wrong.
What's more, not voting at all will always return one of these parties to power given the way that the voting system is rigged, so democracy is really just a figment of the imagination here in that respect.
I've got 3 words for you: Vote Lib Dem. They're committed to overhauling our electoral system and introducing proportional representation, so this cycle can be broken.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
..When the next terrorist attack hits London. With multiple angled shots and clean video feed of hundreds fleeing imminent destruction, it can be played continuously on television and Internet to instill strong emotions of vengeance and hatred for whoever was behind the bombing. With this, the Government can generate more support for fiendish actions. Look at 9/11. How long did they loop those videos of the airplanes? I think by the 15th loop I wanted to kill who did it with my own hands.
See my sig which I put up last week.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Now when I am out speeding on my motorbike I give the finger every mile, just in case there is a camera watching.
Home fucking is killing prostitution.
In any case, with 4.2M security cams in the UK - one camera for every 14 people - it's obvious that pervasive surveliance actually has been implemented.
I just don't understand why so many people voted for Tony Blair -- his party stated that they would not increase a set list of taxes. What happened was obvious: they increased every other tax they could think of, including local government taxes (by reducing the amount that the central government gives to local authorities).
They (the present government) have initiated the destruction of the United Kingdom through devolution. Devolution that has been implemented in a manner higher unfair to England and English voters (since MPs from Scotland get to vote on matters that only affect ENgland, but not the reverse).
They have removed the protections against double jeopardy, limited rights to jury trials, given away BILLIONS to the EU (to settle a dispute between Germany and France -- WTF?). Destroyed the constitution by the "reform" of the House of Lords (which acted many times to prevent over-radical actions by either party).
The UK's pensions were very well funded before Labour came to power, now we have a crisis.
Why, oh why, has it taken to voters so long to see through him? OK, the last years of Conservative government were not filled with triumph, and some time out of power was warranted, but the peccadillos of a few are trifling in comparison to the billions that have been wasted. </rant mode>
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
...it is for the protection and convenience and *profit* of "Big Brother". When you look at it from that point of view, everything they do makes more sense.
To paraphrase my earlier quote, "the law in it's majestic equality protects the property of the rish man and the hobo equally." How much benefit does each get from the "equal" protection afforded their property under the law? It would be hard to argue that the vagrant gets anywhere near the benefit that the rich man does, yet he pays the same sales tax when he buys something.
I am not saying that we all do not benefit from a stable society, I'm just saying the rich benefit more.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
It's like the British government gets all their ideas from Half-Life 2. What's next, three-legged walkers? That country needs an infinite rocket crate, stat.
do not welcome our new flying-drone, picture-taking, robot overlords.
In order to back up that statement you have to prove to me that they are indeed being used to perform the jobs that they are charged with as opposed to engaging in their own forms of spying, and that they are more effective.
In the former case I would point out that the jobs of governments and police officers is to serve the citizens in their community. All too often however that has been twisted to the point where said individuals are, in fact, using their powers to pursue private agendas against the very citizens they claim to protect. Here in the U.S. for example during World War I laws were passed making it a crime to criticize the president "for our protection". During World War II the massive information compiled as part of the Census was used to hunt down American Citizens of Japanese descent and throw them into prison "for their own protection". During the Kennedy years the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover used the powers of his office to spy on politicians he disproved of and to subvert both the anti-war and civil rights movements including the well-documented blackmailing of Martin Luther King. During the 60's Nixon used the tools available to spy on his political rivals. In more recent years 'anti-terror' tools have been used to spy on anti-war groups (because how dare we oppose the Iraq war) and execute increasingly harsh surveillance of "problem communities" (aka black neighborhoods) in the War On Drugs.
In each case the claim was that they were serving their constituents. Nixon himself said that he "thought it would be bad for the country if the president lost an election". And despite claims that it "won't happen again" we can see even modern U.S. Congressmen claiming that it is a good idea:
Similar comments have been made about the recent attempts to spy on American's internet use and telephone traffic "for our own good".
Which brings me to my second point. There is, indeed little to no evidence that the modern tools (e.g. large scale databases or CCTV networks) actually help prevent crime which is, after all the goal. With repsect to "big name" items like the terror suspect lists and the internet surveillance their effectiveness is difficult to judge as they are largely secretive (too secretive) and the evidence that they obtain will never be used in a court of law. While the Justice department likes to point to high-name cases like Jose Padilla and the rest of us like to point out that Padilla is a) being charged in a carefully rigged situation, b) being charged for a small fraction of what they claimed they could prove but did not, and c) is himself surrounded by many many cases which seem likely to never reach trial because nothing at all really happened.
If you want a better arguing point we should look at the large-scale sweeps that were done in New York shortly after 9/11. While these netted a few illegal aliens (at least one of whom died under highly questionable circumstances) and pissed off a large segment of an otherwise legitimate population it failed to net anything useful. But this too might be considered "exceptional".
So let us turn to the daily street crime scenario. While some noise has been made about Chicago's heavy use of surveillance cameras and databases there is little scientific evidence that the cameras "did the trick". While Chicago's rate of cri
And this notion that there is a silent plot by the "wealthy" to constantly control the "sheep" of society via any means they can
It's not silent. Turn on your TV: it's several decibels louder than the regular programming. Of course, that's not exactly what we're talking about in the specific case of constant government surveillance, but you can bet that when you walk into most big stores, they can find out exactly which aisles you were in, what you looked at, and what you bought for the past 5 years unless you pay in cash without the "loyalty card".
I won't disagree that the rich have things easier. But unless you believe in punishing the rich or in true communist/socialist ideals, wealth redistribution, and so on, I don't see how that reality will - or even should - change.
Until we can figure out the opposite of communism, perhaps we would be better off leaving things alone, but when it comes time for change (and that change WILL come, as more and more industries choose to manufacture scarcity over manufacturing goods, it continues to come closer and closer), the proponents of capitalism had best stay out of the way.
the rich benefit more
Because they benefit more from nearly everything.
And frankly, I don't think that is necessarily wrong (again, unless you believe in disproportionately "punishing" the attainment of wealth in some way).
Yes I get oodles of karma but it's the integrity of the discussion on slashdot that matters.
:)
I think that's the comment that should be modded +5 funny.
The enemies of Democracy are
So will RC model flying now become illegal? I can see anyone with a radio on the right frequency knocking these things down. I assume they'll be on different frequencies (gps nav was noted as a possibility) than FCC specifications for RC transmitters, but whats to stop criminals from going outside legal frequencies and busting these things? Given that, will anyone with an RC aircraft transmitter become suspect?
Just think of all the car chases that will come to a quick end once the version with hellfire missiles is rolled out!
The same people that brought you the Iraq are still in office (in the Executive, at least). The electorate had a chance to vote them out of office in 2004. They didn't.
We all need glasses doing 5 min round robin video, allowing us to record any & every event of police brutality.
I mean, lets be honest here, the police keep us safe in two ways:
1) catching the intrinsically violent anti-social types and
2) occupying the other intrinsically violent types who can *often* respect social norms doing it
A true open survalience society is worse for police than average people because cops are intrinsically far more violent than ordinary people.
You may also be worried about your kinks being exposed in a survalience society, but this will pass as every kink, even furry fedishism, becomes as mainstream in everyday life as on the internet.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Its not about making their jobs easier or harder. Its about whether these devices remove people's right to privacy. Without that right, free speech doesn't exist, protection from unwarranted searches is removed, and many other rights are moot or oppressed.
Should we stop something because it makes the job of law enforcement easier? no.
Should we stop something because it removes the basic rights of law abiding citizens? Yes.
Should we stop something because it makes harassment easier? Yes.
Telephones, computers (in general), vehicles, helecopters, and remote controlled robots (depending on their application) don't infringe on people's rights. Cameras on every corner with the ability and threat of watching you even in your home do. No matter what the laws are in this, the threat of being watched in your home is always there and will always be in the backs of people's minds, influencing their actions. In this case with the drones, I will give you, its a little more gray, both in the benefits gained and the threats to privacy.
Clones are people two.
is the UK that dangerous? I mean, I live across the street from Drug Deales and up the street from Gang Members. And I wished they had shit like that flying around out here (Los Angeles, CA).
What crime are the Brits so afraid of? I mean really.
Yes it's all about control, no shit, so the excuse of crime is just plain bullshit
I wonder if they'll have "THIS IS NOT A SPY BLIMP" on the side?
I'd be curious to note how long these systems had been in place and what the effect on the surrounding areas was. Some anecdotal evidence is available to suggest that in the short term crime is reduced in the CCTV areas but increased in the surrounding areas where it is "pushed" to. This has been employed by those arguing that the CCTV areas just be expanded until crime is "pushed" indefinitely far away. However there exists other evidence to indicate that, after the initial installation crime will again return to an area once the cameras have been around for a while making the reduction short term at best.
Similarly I would bet that some of the installs might coincide with other investment in an area. As such the effects of the cameras might not be separable from the effects of repaired sidewalks, new stores, open buildings, etc. All of which are known to change the patterns of crime.
As such it would seem to me that the studies face the potential for mitigating factors. When I have time I'll read them and see if they are even reported.
Battery operated, carrying a camera and only the moving blades to hold it up. This thing will have a flight time of about 5 minutes.
Deleted
I believe in fairness, egalitarianism, and reciprocity. I believe in limiting the attainment of unfair levels of wealth. Most wealthy are wealthy due more to luck, connections, and lack of morals than due to anything that is of tangible benefit to the rest of society. Why should society then reward the rich?
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
It doesn't even need 51% (simple majority for one of 2 choices) - if there are 3 options, the majority figure could be as low as 34%. As long as the other two options can fight each other, rather than ganging up and defeating you, then you're sorted.
"She's furniture with a pulse"
According to BBC Radio 4 these things are helicopter type devices with 7 cameras on board, their key benefit is the fact that they are rapidly deployable. However they have a range of... 500 meters, oh and they are categorised as "toys". (they are apparently lighter than a bag of sugar too, although the size of the bag in question was not mentioned)
So its not a Predator type UAV sitting for hours 500 miles from the launch site, with a tangle of sensors and weapons attached, more of an instant CCTV camera, maybe useful for crowd control or events... (or just for propaganda value).
Saying that I a not terribly comfortable with the direction this is taking, I close to a city centre (with a really low crime rate - except with regard to burglaries...), and it bothers me that in 5-10 years there may be stealthy drones airborne over my house or garden without my knowledge, taking pictures.
I wish we could get back to having a few more Police officers knocking about, on foot, talking to people.
Yes we did. We vote for cameras every time we vote for a candidate that is in favour of them or hasn't got a stated policy on them.
Yes we do. We have the option of voting for politicians that actually reflect our wishes.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
Exactly. The "death of privacy" scenario has far less to do with your government that it has to do with your fellow citizens. Individuals have just as much ability to leverage cheap technology as governments do. I know the day is coming when I will be recorded almost constantly in public, but it won't be by government cameras alone. It'll be by the cameras installed outside every home and business, and carried by every person I pass on the street.
I've been waiting for some manufacturer to offer an inexpensive CMOS image sensor and microphone unit that plugs into an iPod and records compressed digital video. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet. You clip the unit to the front of your shirt, plug it into your iPod, and you're good to go for hours. In a few more years iPods will have the capacity to record days of continuous video as long as the battery holds out. I worry far less what the government will do with the images made of me; the goverment can at least be changed or influenced by votes, legislation, and protests. I have no influence whatsoever over the hundreds of individuals who'll also be keeping me under surveillance.
I think it is more likely that someone thinks they can get by with fewer officers while using the drones so cutting expenses, earning themselves a bonus. Therefore falling more in line with the stupidity thing than malice.
See, there's this thing called the "right to privacy". I'm not sure they have it in the UK, but we do here in the good ol' USA (which doesn't stop our government from infringing upon it, but that's another story.)
... yet
IANALY*, but I believe it would be covered under the Fourth Amendment right of protection against unreasonable searches.
Simply put, if you are doing nothing wrong, you have the right to be (and right well should be) left alone.
*
What's a fair level of wealth? What is unfair? Who gets to decide?
The power and connections that come along with wealth are unavoidable, and the saying, "It takes money to make money", is as true as ever.
Your conclusion that "most" wealthy are rich due to luck and don't actually contribute anything tangible to society is only correct if you are perhaps considering the super-wealthy, which constitute such a small number of people that they're not even worth discussing. And they aren't the ones controlling the world - it's a much, much larger group of people. To say that one is in the "wealthiest 1%", which has been a sound bite in many previous discussions on this topic, doesn't take a lot of income. As of 2000, it was just over $200,000/year. Is that what you consider "wealthy"? There are millions of these people, and most of them are wealthy because of their own hard work and contributions to society, including the business they often run which employ so many others. We're not talking about faceless megacorporations, here. We're talking about the millions of businesses that make economies run.
The bottom 50% of wage-earners in the US pay less than 3% of the tax burden (with many at the bottom paying nothing). The top 5% pay over 60% - the top 1% almost half themselves. What if we made the bottom pay nothing, and put all the tax burden, on, say the top 5% or 1%. Would that be fair? The rich would still have so much more than the poor. Should we maybe take some away from them and, you know, spread it around? How do you limit wealth you consider "unfair"? Why is it "unfair"? Who decides how much is too much?
If you're concerned about limiting freedoms, that would be one of the more egregious affronts to "freedom" I could think of.
Well this is a fair point. Does the fact the police can track you down faster put you off committing the crime, or do you wear a hooded top or murder innocent people in a remote field?
That said, it's not about real control. That's done by the education system, the legal system and good old fashioned advertising.
So I don't think that having video feeds is real control. Would you buy a remote controlled car which just showed you pictures of what the car had done? No I thought not.
I feel sorry for the poor bastards who have to watch hours of mindless boring security camera footage everyday.
29 mpg. YMMV.
If I had any mod points you'd have them :) Too often group think sugarcoats a shit sandwich. We need fresh stereotypes :)
>I was in London a while back, and the cameras in the underground stations did make me feel safer.
Which is what they are there to do and why they are a problem.
They make you FEEL safer.
They do not make you safer.
+----------------- | What is the question!
BRITS: "1984" was supposed to be a warning, not a gorram instruction manual!
in the United Gulags of America.
Yours truly,
Kilgore Trout
Everybody shout and scream cause they see where will this lead to. The cameras are, in fact, a good thing per sé, as of today.
It's like feeling threatened when your chess opponent moves his bishop. The move itself may not present a risk, now. But it will definitely play a role later in the game so you better take it out now before it's too late.
On the other side, you will try hide your intentions to your opponent until it's too late for him.
On the internet you see articles about photographer's rights and freedoms. The general advice is that you are free to take a picture of anything on publich property or even anything FROM public property. Why do people get so bent out of shape being photographed in public. You have no expectation of privacy in a public place. A Big Brother society would be one in which you are photographed by the government in PRIVATE places, which has never happened and there is no slippery slope leading that direction. Camera are just a tool to extend the range of limited police manpower. I don't see an issue.
The quote actually reads, "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." It's also unclear whether Franklin was the original author of this quote, but that's beside the point.
Anyway, not only did you misquote Franklin (amusing given your criticism of folks not reading their history), but you also fail to explain whether and why it is an essential liberty to not be photographed in public. (Or, for that matter, the other various alleged infringements on civil liberties by us Yanks - though I'll happily admit that at least some of the powers we've given our government recently, or that our government has chosen to appropriate for itself, go too far.)
There has to be some sort of surveilance to enable law enforcement / governments to combat organized crime and terror. There is no other acceptible way around it. And as the surveilance entities get more powerful (e.g. Hoover) other agencies (civil or government) have to hold them in check. That is the purpose of having officers from, say, JAG embeded with units.
I don't think that safety, freedom, and privacy can be had in absolute, at the same time. There has to be gives and takes. The important factor here are well audited internal affairs / JAG / IG agencies to curtail abuse.
Now with actual linkage goodness.
You can't take the sky from me...
I know a lot of slashdotters seem paranoid about this kind of stuff, but the truth is if the government/police/"the man" wants to screw you over, he doesn't need an elaborate camera system. It is a lot easier just to fabricate charges or plant evidence or whatever. If the powers that be want to screw you, then you are pretty much screwed.
Something that people fail to realize is that the cameras can prevent law enforcement from screwing you over. You don't have to look very far past Rodney King to see that.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Remember remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot...
"In public, you have no right to privacy."
And if you put something into the public, you have no right to copyright protection, and are suseptable to the "analog hole".
Put a big sign on your roof that says "Crack House" with an arrow pointing next door.
Have gnu, will travel.
When I was a kid I always thought it was the coolest thing when ever the St Louis police helicopter (aka the Brown Hornet, it was brown, duh) landed in the parking lot of the Wendy's down the street. They'd kick the observer out to grab a bag of burgers.
I moved to the UK last year for work, and the only difference between the US and the UK is the fact the CCTV camera are labeled in the UK and typically not so in the US. Other than that there don't seem to be any more or less of them. What you don't see much of is the police. They don't "Fly the flag" near as much as they do in the US.
The only other thing that cracks me up is the radar cameras, most of which seem to have had every possible form of vandalism done to them. From being painted over to being blown up. I even saw one funny picture of a guy with a porky pig mask on with an fireman's emergency gas powered saw making short work of the post one was mounted on.
One poster who said they were from London said that they counted twenty cameras during a seven minute walk. The area seemed to be one with high surveilance.
Do it twice a day and you have forty camera photo ops. If you go home for lunch, that ups it to eighty.
Now add shopping, socializing and other activities and you might hit two or three times that, especially if you are doing them in high surveilance areas.
Then add in the factor that many people may spend longer periods out in public, increasing the odds of encountering a photo op. Using the same figures, a twenty minute walk might mean encountering sixty cameras each way.
Of course, this is all conjecture. It would be interesting if the group that came up with the 300 photo count provided the data and statistics they used to derive the number. Then we could argue methods.
The only thing that's not surprising is that whenever a story comes up about a new Stalinist police tactic, daveschroeder there to make posts to cheer them on with staunch support.
Apparently you're unaware of the fact that throughout human history, governments have killed many times more innocent people than terrorists and criminals combined.
...I see no reason the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot.
Reality has a conservative bias: it conserves mass, energy, momentum...
The problem lies not so much with keeping society from falling into chaos, it is all to do with increasingly fine-grained control over individual freedom. Using sophisticated technology to scrutinize individual actions in increasing detail reduces citizens of society from free agents into animals running around in a cage during a Pavlov experiment.
One (admittedly overstated example): Lets assume government decides to closer monitor individuals on welfare to make sure tax dollars are spent wisely. All nice and dandy to this point. Next, lets assume that it is found that some individuals spend time on so-called 'high-risk to health' activities like smoking, drinking, mountain-climbing, taking detours going home from the welfare department, sunbathing, walking the neighbour's dog, bicycling instead of taking the bus, etc...
The question is: how much of an individual's life do authorities need to control in order to keep society functioning and how much is 'too much'?
The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
Going slightly tangental -
The thing about surveilance cameras is that it's impossible to surveil them all.
Think about it - you could have ubiquitous surveilance, but you're never going to be able to monitor each camera. The more you add, the larger the problem gets.
The data arguably only becomes relevant and useful when a crime has been reported / caught / noticed - digging the data stream becomes useful.
Until such a time when each and every camera can read your mind, or you KNOW it's being watched, odds are with you that what you do will be unnoticed, nefarious or otherwise.
Sorry, but you have no right to privacy in a public place. That's an oxymoron. If you want to maintain your privacy, stay home, where you can be reasonably assured of your right to privacy.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
So the UK government is planning on killing people (or enabling their killing) via the use of unmanned drone aircraft?
Please. Do tell.
Drones, cameras, and overall law-enforcement awareness are great *if* our laws are rational. And if they can be trusted to always remain so.
Are they? Can they?
FATMOUSE + YOU = FATMOUSE
The police in the UK are wise to that one.
Whenever the police shoot an innocent person here in the UK, the cameras are always "undergoing maintenance" or having "technical problems" at the time. See, for example, here.
"So you wouldn't mind if a policeman could follow you everywhere you went in public?"
They do. They're called security guards. Besides as I pointed out above there's nothing to stop people from observing you in public. Weither one minds or not is irrelevent because as long as you're in public it will be true. Now if you could get some kind of DRM on your copyrighted self, then you'd have a point? But we all know how well that would work out.
I agree.
The point is that modern "democracies" aren't true democracies, safety measures were implemented for that very reason. The US has the constitution (and it's amendments such as the bill of rights) to prevent tyranny of the majority. Checks and balances, representative democracy and even the electoral college (the idea being that the state representatives could vote against their state's voter's decision if need be) were also part of this. Even the courts which abuse their powers at times are an important element moderating the power of the masses.
I guess in a perfect society you wouldn't need any type of surveillance as there would be no crime. I can't argue that there should not be any of any kind. More and more I am seeing crimes being caught on camera. But at some point it all starts to give me a creepy feeling. I know that as human beings we all have faults and the police are no different. I guess if you trust your government, intense surveillance is no big deal. It gives me the creeps.
I agree that it is not the tools. However, where are the laws that protect their use? These laws are being eroded here in the USA. It seems the more tech. that comes along the more the laws that protect abuse of those tools are being eroded.
General, you are listening to a machine! Do the world a favor and don't act like one.
It's because women can vote. Women are all for opression if that opression is aimed at men (EEEVIL RAPISTS ETC).
Women's rights must be destroyed.
I actually think it would be cool to record my entire day with video and audio. Hook it up to my glasses so it sees everything I see. Total recall.
There would be a lot more privacy issues though if this were to ever come about. What if you were near a traffic accident or a crime? Does the government get a warrant to view your video that includes both public and private stuff on it? How do you separate what is private and what is public? What if you are having sex, and look out the window and see a car wreck?
The GP is correct about a new world coming.
If they have so many cameras all over the place, why weren't they able to identify and stop the torching of the Cutty Sark before damage was done? The vandals should have been spotted and detained immediately. Instead they have no clue who did what, except that they may or may not have been driving a silver car.
Please. Do tell.
In a free society, the job of the policeman is not supposed to be an easy one.
If you're just too goddamned stupid to understand that, there's certainly nothing that I can do to help. Read some Orwell, or some Solzhenitsyn.
The government has access to the data and can spy/watch the sheople. However, are the sheople allowed access to the data to spy/watch the government?
My biggest problem with this stuff is that it only empowers the government and lessens the power of the people. Now if this data was available in the public domain so that a person can spy/watch Tony Blair and other members of the government, then I think it would be fair.
General, you are listening to a machine! Do the world a favor and don't act like one.
I could imagine citizen upon citzen videotaping taking off on the streets and highways as an extension/reply to road rage. Everybody starts taping the "other guy" driving poorly and reporting them to the police. It might turn out for the good, or it could make things even worse.
I'd like to take things back to the good old days of 90% tax rates and a booming economy where the middle class could actually look forward to their children having a better life then they did. Wealth is a positive freedom: the freedom to make money. Survival is a negative freedom, the freedom from having the means of survival taken away from you. Extreme wealth means extreme imbalance of wealth, and thus extreme poverty, meaning that many will be denied access to the means of survival. This is a greater restriction on freedom than any restrictions on wealth.
As to who decides, the majority decides. If the minority of wealthy don't like it, tough. They would not be wealthy without society. If they don't like it, they can leave and go live by themselves on a deserted island some place. Which is more of a choice than most of them propose to give most of us, that choice amounting to: make money for us as "consumers" or die in a gutter.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
"300 photographs" means "captured on 300 CCTV cameras"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1789157.stm
That was the statistic being banded around in 2002, anyway. There are a few more cameras now.
"proportional representation, so this cycle can be broken."
From the US, which has had proportional representation in 1/2 of the legislative branch for over 200 years, all I can say is "BWAAAhahahahaha"
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
At first, it's likely that only deserving suspects will be targeted. However, the burden of proof would be on you to show how it's impossible that this will ever be abused, or that government addiction to its new powers won't lead it down the path of ever-more intrusive snooping. You have offered no such proof, and it's pretty clear that you just naively don't care whether there is any oversight or accountability for these kinds of systems.
Just because I express an opinion which may be unpopular, apparently makes me a troll. Maybe the post was off-topic (but even this I doubt, since it pertains to civil liberties in the UK, which are essentially what the article is about).
But no, apparently criticising the left wing of politics is not allowed and rather than discource, we have to label those with whom we disagree as trolls. Well, whoever modded my post this way is a coward.
I fully expect this post to be modded into oblivion also.
There you go, bringing your rationality into a perfectly good conspiracy theory. How boring.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Unfortunately we have a large contingent of people who read Orwell the way fundamentalists read the Bible.
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
For the cameras to exert social control, the perception of surveillance is what counts. This is good to the extent that it deters criminals from commiting crimes. The main criticism of these cameras, however, is that they change the behavior of everybody. People behave differently when they believe they believe they are being watched. They act in accordance with how they believe their behavior will be perceived. This perception therefore acts as a powerful form of control, one which is internalized by those under surveillance. See Foucault's characterization of the Panopticon.
Surely you have known people who "put on a face" in public. Perhaps they conceal their intelligence or hide their beliefs or suppress their individuality. If our response to surveillance is to suppress the unique or unusual dimensions of our character, it also gives us permission to exhibit other behaviors. This happens all the time with bullies - witness the recent British phenomenon of happy slapping; it seems perhaps relevant that this is happening in a heavily-surveilled society. Similarly, crimes like those of the Nazis or of Rwanda could probably not have happened without surveillance.
Surveillance can eliminate difference and diversity, while also suppressing morality. All that matters is the perception - there need not be anyone recording or watching the cameras. That is the great danger, and those who make the argument are hardly "idiots".
We have the option of voting for politicians that actually reflect our wishes.
How old are you ? 15 ? I live in Québec. We just had an election and I didn't vote. There was seven candidate in my district. 3 from major party and with the same views on everything (the only difference is how much money they promise to some particular group). 1 that is the complete opposite of what I want on about everything. 1 without any kind of program or ideas whatsoever, and 2 complete fools who just wanted to make a point about a single idea. Not a single one had a program that I found acceptable. Democracy is a joke.
Only 100? I guess that's ok then. I look forward to the UK implementing the toilet bowl cam to spot rectal smugglers.
In fascist Amerika, one can not critique the rich. It's the new Divine Right of Kings: The Divine Right of the Rich to their Money. After all, Wealthiness is next to Godliness. If God didn't want people to be rich, why, he wouldn't have showered them with cash. I mean really, where do I get off criticizing the rich? Without them, we'd all starve. It is only through their charitable good works that we even have jobs in the first place.
I'm reminded of a quote: "God shows his contempt for wealth in the choice of people he chooses to shower it upon." The sad thing is, I bet the person who modded the above down is not even rich. They just identify with the rich, and think that if they protect the interests of the rich, someday they may be rich. Because that's worked really well for collaborators throughout history. Suckers.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
First Skynet... now this.
it sez: small blimp, R/C motors, and an anti-aircraft gun mounted on it, for the slow-moving drones, and one of those nifty R/C jets for the fast-moving ones.
It could be called the Battle Of Britain.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
Unlike the US, the UK has more than two parties which win seats. There's a serious possibility that the next general election will result in a hung Parliament, and that would be even more likely were it to be carried out with proportional representation.
Interesting how the blindly-loyal government supporters have and use mod points here on Slashdot any time someone suggests there's something wrong with the government.
You don't even need a cannon or know what frequency the helocopter is controlled on. If your near the helicopter all you need is
a strong broadband signal in the general vacinity of the helicopter. i'd imaging the r/c is just using narrow band FM modulation
I highly doubt that it's a spread spectrum digital signal. Even if it's spread spectrum you can make a high power microwave transmitter , focus the beam on the helicopter and jam the reciever. Helecopters are tough to fly in certain wind situations so a brief radio outage would be enough for the tail roter not to spin fast enough and they will loose control and it will crash.
That's only true when the citizens have equal access to the footage. Note that almost all of these surveillance systems are asymmetric; the footage is only directly available to the police, and the police decide who else can see the footage. They thus work, on a net assessment, to the benefit of the operators. (Fortunately, at times the benefit of the operators coincides with the benefit of the observed, but don't pretend this must always -- or even frequently -- be the case.)
By the way, you are always free to move to a small farm or commune and practice subsistence agriculture, to consume nothing you didn't produce and die in no gutter, or even have a gutter for that matter. Some people do. I saw them on TV once.
As to who decides, the majority decides. If the minority of wealthy don't like it, tough. They would not be wealthy without society. If they don't like it, they can leave and go live by themselves on a deserted island some place.
Well, that's the salient difference between a Democracy and a Republic (Constitutional Democratic Republic, if you want to get pedantic about it).
The Majority does not rule. We can argue all day whether that is a good thing or a bad thing. Historically, I don't think you'll find a period where Majority *did* rule, at least not for long. Society is always ruled by an elite minority. It's always been the degree to which the ruling elite were subject to input from the masses. Torches and pitchforks, or guillotines, for the stubborn ones.
The Constitution is there to protect the minorities from being victimized by majorities. Equal rights, equal protection under the law.
It is unfortunate that equality doesn't extend to economics. But, I think economics THRIVES on inequalities. Otherwise, why would anybody trade something of value for something else?
Which is more of a choice than most of them propose to give most of us, that choice amounting to: make money for us as "consumers" or die in a gutter.
I disagree with the Conservative argument that says that the poor masses would starve if it weren't for the brilliant and philanthropic genius enterprenuers and their generosity and vision. That if we (the masses, the majority) were to oppress the rich with high taxes, that they'd leave and all economic activity would halt. I think, that in a lot of cases, if a "rich" player left the economy altogether because we tax them too high (for example, all the businesses that are supposedly fleeing California's oppressive regime of taxes and regulation - yeah, right) that it would merely open an opportunity for another willing player to step in. This happens all the time, in nature. If an environment gets too harsh for one life form, another one steps in and occupies that niche. The only reason it may not happen in markets, is if there's no available capital (example: the Great Depression - or any time monetary policy is too tight). Which, I suppose, is the ecological equivalent of an environment with insufficient energy for life to thrive.
On the other hand, a majority that is parasitic to a minority can't thrive either.
I don't mind being a consumer. I mind having my choices artificially constrained. And I mind having my individual rights (like privacy, or freedom of speech) trampled by a terrorized majority (keep in mind, that Bush was re-elected (and his policies approved), by a majority of voting Americans; vote fraud notwithstanding; even if that represents maybe 10-20% of the votes - it's still a scary-large chunk of the US population). I don't give a crap if 99% of Americans are afraid of Osama bin Laden. It still gives them no damn right to listen to my phone calls without a warrant or judicial oversight.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
A freind of mine was vacationing in London last month and as he was stumbling to his hotel from the bar, he was pick-pocketed. Five minutes later a police officer came up to him and asked if his name was Dave. After he responded that he was indeed Dave the officer asked him if he had lost his wallet. After checking his pocket and realizing that this was also true, the officer gave him a ride back to the hotel and prompted him to come by the station in the morning to give a statement and get his property back with nothing missing.
If this had happened in New York, the wallet would have been gone which could have created a really uncomfortable situation for him in a foreign country.
So while I don't know how I feel about the constant survalence issue, it seems to have some use.
All the major UK parties have "Law and Order" as a plank of their manifestos
Wow. I didn't realize TV serials in the US were that popular in the UK
When? The fifties. Look it up. Plenty of people think raising taxes helps the economy. In fact, recent events have shown that lowering taxes does not encourage investment. Businesses invest based on projections of future demand, not availability of capital. Duh.
People who forget history are doomed to repeat it. I just wish you wouldn't drag the rest of us along for that ride.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
How long till we get 'man hacks' from half life two?
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
There are FOUR MILLION plus of them in the UK. Holy cow. How long do they keep the data? Hey I am not considered by most people liberal but that just creeps me out. I guess I feel that people have a right to feel free and being under constant surveillance doesn't make me feel free. The very idea that the government could track every movement I make just seems wrong. I would have to work hard to get people to vote to stop it if I lived in the UK.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
... are doomed to live it. See Larry Niven's story "Cloak of Anarchy".
Nothing for 6-digit uids?
This is all based on a basic idea, which is that you have privacy when you are walking around in the street. I don't know where that idea comes from, maybe because the US is less densely populated in parts, but the idea of walking around an urban area without being seen by (gasp) live people is just ridiculous in England. Maybe if you're in the outskirts at 3am, you might avoid walking past somebody for 20 minutes or so, tops.
If I go out onto the street and walk around naked, well, that'd be a violation of the law and only an idiot would try and turn it into a privacy issue. By definition, if you aren't inside your house with the curtains drawn, people you don't know can probably see you. To pretend otherwise is fallacious.
One other thing I don't get. For some reason, bobbies on the beat don't cause privacy issues, but when technology is used, that magically makes it a privacy invasion.
After watching several episodes of Doctor Who, I can safely say that aliens are in control of those cameras and they mean you no good!
Yes I get oodles of karma but it's the integrity of the discussion on slashdot that matters.
But the 14.2 million figure in the article works out at only one karma for every 14 people.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Everybody has the opportunity to make money and maintain their own means of survival. The fact that so many don't take advantage of that opportunity isn't my fault, and it isn't my responsibility to cover the cost of their lack of ambition and/or work ethic.
Most poor people are poor because they squandered their opportunities, not because "the man" is keeping them down. Propping them up as victims only encourages them to blame others for their own failures, and continue living off of the hard work of others.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
I saw a video clip of some you gentlemen kicking some poor unfortunates head in while he lay on the road. Stamped his head against the kerb stones, several times.
Thanks to the video
1) they were caught
2) they were found guilty
3) they could not have a lawyer pretend it was self defence, or a row that got out of hand, or provoked, or not all that serious an asault.
While they rot in Jail, I for one will not be protesting for their civil liberties.
Aw poor babies didn't get a fair trial, there was too much evidence against them...
http://davesboat.blogspot.com/
Referring to the 60s and 70s however the U.S. Treasury, certainly not the most anti-tax organization in the world had this to say
Unfortunately I can't find a good quote for why taxes are negatively correlated with growth today by someone we would both respect right now, but I have stacks of Economist magazines at home that are full of good statistics, if you want to continue discussing later.
If we really trusted the will of the majority, there would be no need for a Bill of Rights. We would just assume that the majority would always elect politicians who could be trusted to respect our rights, or that the majority would remove any politicians who didn't, or rely on referenda.
Or we would assume that if you're outvoted, you have no rights.
Revive the Constitution.
Given that they're paid by taxpayers I guess that data should be public. Would stop abuse rather quickly..
Insert
I think the time you'll be able to overtly record government officials will be measured in seconds. This whole surveillance drive comes associated with an increasing asymmetry in who is subject to the rule of law.
Bush is giving the best example. From how many laws did he exempt himself again?
You were watching propaganda designed to sell you a bad bill of goods.
The best way to sell a bad bill of goods to somebody is to mix in a few good nuts with all the poison pills you want people to consume.
Interestingly, even with the cameras in place, the crime you describe still took place, so it didn't make things any safer for the victim. Further, jokers who attack people generally find their way to prison regardless. That's just how it works. So since the crime took place even with cameras in place, and since these guys were headed for prison anyway, how does that validate a surveillance state?
-FL
2 points:
1. There are actually plenty of streets in towns outside London where you can walk along and not bump into someone. London is one of the most densely populated areas of the UK. Personally, I don't like the atmosphere that creates, which is why I stay away.
2. People on the street are real humans. They probably aren't watching you, and they almost certainly aren't recording you. Police in watchrooms may well be watching you with trained eyes, and are recording. Major difference.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Nice myth, it certainly keeps you in the clear. Ask yourself, what's easier for me to believe, that I got where I am through hard work and determination, or that I got where I am because the system is unfair. Funny how most people's beliefs end up making them look good.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
make money for us as "consumers" or die in a gutter.
So YOU were the one charged with coming up with the new RIAA motto?
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Taxes are good for the economy.
They go to fund things like roads, airport, seaports, housing development, electricity, water, and gas supplies, and an enormous number of other things, the lack of which would mean Bad News for the economy.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Bob Shaw had an interesting take on the surveillance society back in 1972.
Basically, a scientist creates 'slow glass' - glass through which light passes much more slowly than regular glass. Many of the inter-connected short stories are about specific applications - a detective waits for the image to come through on a piece of 5-year glass to prove that the man who'd been executed for murder was the right one; a murderer uses a piece of slow glass in his car windscreen to make it appear another man is driving his truck.
The end of the book is the scientist who created slow glass (Retardite TM) realising that the governments of the world are using it for espionage and worse, dusting the entire world with microscopic crystals that will capture images of everything, everywhere.
"From now on, came the silent scream inside his head, anybody, any agency, with the right equipment can find out anything about ANYBODY! This planet is one huge unblinking eye watching everything that moves on its surface. We're all encased in glass, asphyxiating, like bugs dropped into a entomologist's killing bottle."
But less than a page from this realisation comes a short epilogue which contains this sentence:
"In later decades, men were to come to accept the universal presence of Retardite eyes, and they learned to live without subterfuge or shame as they had done in a distant past when it was known that the eyes of God could see everywhere."
Maybe universal surveillance is a good thing, as long as it's genuinely universal. Maybe if the politicians and lawmen knew they were being watched 24/7 along with everyone else, they'd have to behave properly as well.
...come visit, and every day, a young person is shot, someone else is mugged. All criminals have to do is avoid the cameras. A police man has legs so can give chase and can make a common sense judgement. With a camera, you are guilty and your privacy invaded before you are judged guilty. I am British and am far more worried about our surveilance society than terrorism. And ironically, with many people or religious groups disliking being photographed in general, I believe such technology will in fact CREAT a new breed of 'terrorist', and that will be the silent middle class who are slowly realising what is happening to this nation and will rise up. Yes really. And the sooner the better too.
O'WONDERWe're working on it.
mod parent up. I have had personal experiences of this nature working at a convenience store.
"Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way", to quote Pink Floyd.
Ok, lets see who is better at doing their job and who is not.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcBwMKNKQNQ
While I too advocate the right to privacy, I do not see how under mass surveillance "free speech doesn't exist, protection from unwarranted searches is removed".
Firstly, whether or not every waking moment of my day is observed or not, I may say whatever I damn well please.
Secondly, footage taken of you in your own home without warrant isn't admissable evidence, as per (my understand of) the Fourth Amendment. So this can only be true if both the police and courts and astoundingly corrupt (in which case the cameras are the least of your problems).
Well, to help make it a little more believable, consider a wealthy family living in a second or third world country. They commonly have private security guards, high walls, electric fences, attack dogs and will occasionally employ extrajudicial means to protect themselves since local law enforcement is inadequate. It's not that they're wealthy, but that they don't want to become poor.
Now consider a wealthy (not upper middle class, but millionaire/billionaire) family living in London. Around their mansion, they have high walls, electric fences, security guards, possibly attack dogs and will also occasionally employ extrajudicial means to protect themselves and their assets. They feel vulnerable because their living standards are so far above everyone else's (or so they perceive). It's not that they're wealthy, but who can blame them for wanting to stay that way?
It is not a silent evil plot, but nonetheless the extreme measures being taken in the UK to 'secure' the streets are serving none other than the wealthy who, in their justifiable paranoia are using their political influence to press for these advancements in law enforcement. Ask people in the street and you will find that practically no ordinary person likes being watched.
I find that introduction of mass surveillance being merely due to the honest good will of middle management is a little too much of a stretch for me.
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
Sig Registration Form 34c_766(a) submitted to Ministry of Signature Management. Approval pending.
... Never mind the civil liberties crap. We have a bigger problem. Here, on what may be the most geek-heavy community on earth, someone quotes 'V for Vendetta' and refers to it as a 'recent movie' as opposed to a 'classic 1980s comic series'. And gets +5 Informative for doing so.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
The top 1% pay 60%? You must be joking. By the time they're that rich, they'll be squirreling their money away in trust, funds, off-shore bank accounts and generally pretending they're 90% poorer than they actually are. And then they only pay tax on income, not on the heaping armfuls of assets they already have.
I actually think that something like this is our best defence. Sousveillance. Let Big Brother watch the streets at all times if he wishes. Very well, but if he chooses to send out the filth to suppress a legitimate demonstration, they'll be on camera too. Cameras they maybe can't see. Cameras that are connected to 3G phones, that instantly relay all they see to servers in another country. Cameras such that they have no hope of neutering with 'right you scum, hand over the film!'
If what we fear is that the State will abuse the power it gains by this pervasive surveillance, let's make sure that anything the State tries to do is in turn surveilled by the people. And any abuse of power of any kind will surely be on Youtube within an hour.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
> so i think we need to retire the 1984 references, and lose the obsession with an intrusive government... because we can intrude right back
... You've read 1984, right? Recently? The entire punch line is that the surveylance structure exists purely based upon a power lust and NOTHING more. Each entity within the structure is either perpetrating the opression, or tacitly supporting it due to the apparent "protection" it provides from "X" (e.g. terrorism, or ...oh, look: the Russians are back).
Umm
That "we" can "intrude right back" is completely, completely missing the point.
BBC's Digital Planet radio show has an interesting segment about accessing the video from the hundreds of CCTV cameras in Britain and using them to make a film. Thanks to the data protection act in Britain you can request a copy of CCTV footage that you appear in. Some film makers have been using this footage to make a film called FACELESS . They have censored the faces of other people that appear in the video obtained under the data protection act. Pretty great idea I think. This leads me to wonder if they will get some free arial footage from the spy drones :-)
I have no problem being filmed 300 times a day as long as I get some per-incident royalties. I'm a whore, but not cheap. Talk to my agent, baby!
Horns are really just a broken halo.
The top 1% pay 60%? You must be joking.
No, I'm not. And it's the top 5% that pay around 60%. The "top 1%" pay around half of the tax burden. That's not in dispute; that's statistically what they actually pay. I know this might be difficult for you to believe.
Also, are you joking? In order to be in the top 1%, you don't need to be fabulously wealthy with private jets and 50 foot ocean yachts. You only need to make about $250,000 a year (as of 2000 figures). And uh, that's not that much of a stretch.
I don't care how much money you think they are squirreling away, or how much they actually are squirreling away, frankly. They STILL are paying that much of the tax burden. But see, even if we made the top 5% or 1% pay 100% of the tax, you'd still think they have too much money, right? Or we'd come back to the tired old sales tax vs income tax arguments.
The vast majority of people in these classes don't have secret trusts and offshore bank accounts. They're normal people who have family incomes of $300,000 a year. It doesn't take much at all to get to that point, and takes nothing more than a couple decent jobs after college to hit the top 5%. Those groups already pay a disproportionate share of the tax, and that is fine, but only to a point.
But you're probably one of those folks who thinks it's "unfair" they have as much as they do, and still wouldn't be satisfied even if they shouldered the entire tax burden - sales and income - for all of society (to say nothing of how ridiculously unfair that would be). Because they'd still have "too much" for your tastes.
Broken how? In order to exist in permanent coalition, the parties would have to get even closer to each other than they are now, and voting would become even more of a beauty contest than it is today, with nothing of substance to separate the parties - the current "moderate" (actually heavily authoritarian, pro-corporate, anti-individual, regressively-taxing) political climate would be entrenched forever. And of course, let's not forget that the main beneficiaries of proportional representation would be... the Liberal Democrats. Whodathunkit?
The current system has its share of glaring deficiencies, but proportional representation would only fix one of them - and it might just provide the means for the rest to become a whole lot worse.
nah, I'd guess it was more of the anti-gun crowd that didn't like the general theme of the message.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
I'm not saying that the cameras are useless. I just think they instill a false sense of security.
Where the people don't have to update their profiles... John Smith is doing his laundry (with photo!)
Well of course taxes are necessary. The argument was whether or not higher taxes spur growth in the economy. Higher taxes spur growth of the public sector, which is known to be less efficient. You ever work for a government contractor? You ever wonder why highways stay under construction for years at a time? Simultaneously public spending displaces work which could have been done in the private sector.
I thought of a good example during the day. I live in California where we have high taxes. I can't think of one thing the government here does that the government of Texas, which has no state income tax and only marginally higher sales tax, does not do. I will state without proof (although it has been proven) that state taxes correlate not with the services the state provides but to real estate prices, a proxy for the desirability of living there. Kind of makes you wonder what they do with the money. Wrt california, I haven't been able to find an answer yet.
I have no doubt that something like this will be released within a decade.
Just look at how storage capacity has been increasing. Just 6 years ago the first 100GB HDDs reached the desktop. This year we've hit 1,000GB. In 2013 10,000GB will be enough to store 6,000 hours of 480p A/V which is about every waking moment for an entire year.
Here is a recent lengthy story about 'lifelogging' from The Chronicle of Higher Education:
http://chronicle.com/free/v53/i23/23a03001.htm
The UK seems to be taking a lesson from Stallinist Russia. Report your neighbors for even thinking non-party thoughts and have them killed. Of course, crime was pretty rare in such a society. Punishment was severe. But maybe that's a good thing -- considering how many people today do heinous crimes against other people and walk away or get a slap on the wrist... Take away all forms of personal freedom and privacy and you have no crime. Simple as that. Don't worry America! You aren't far behind! Where there is no freedom or privacy -- there is no crime. The question is -- do we WANT a society where we are watched and babysat by the government 24 hours a day? Do you really TRUST or WANT the government to completely monitor your daily life? (And for the dick-heads that think it is 'all good' -- yes, citizen -- if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear.)
The bottom 50% of wage-earners in the US pay less than 3% of the tax burden (with many at the bottom paying nothing). The top 5% pay over 60% - the top 1% almost half themselves.
This is a very misleading statistic.
The elite are not "wage-earners".
And the Truly Wealthy do not pay tax.
Surely having your curtains closed in broad daylight on a large number of occasions when *public* surveylance shows you were clearly in the house along with certain other undesirables will then construed in court to suggest to the jury that you were clearly up to something.
Maybe not conclusive evidence either way but one stroke of the brush towards painting you as a terrorist.
See, for example, current terrorism trials in the UK pointing out that someone occasioanally attended a certain mosque where a certain preacher sometimes delivered anti-western speeches. Exactly what that has to do with the actual evidence about wether the person in question physically constructed a bomb is beyond me.
If you don't risk failure you don't risk success.
> Should we stop something because it removes the basic rights of law abiding citizens? Yes.
Since when was it a right to not be seen in public? If you don't like being seen in public, then don't go out. Apart from criminals, who cares about being watched on CCTV?
> Should we stop something because it makes harassment easier? Yes.
I really really don't mind criminals being harassed. That's kind of the entire point of the cameras. People that simply walk through the shot and don't do anything (ie non criminals) are not going to get harassed for just walking down the street.
No way, because you're ignoring the fact that it would allow for a ton of other parties to get into parliament. With any luck, people would realise that their vote actually counted, and start voting for who they want to be in. ie. Not a bunch of 'middle-grounders', like Labour and Conservative.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
All cameras do is make retribution and revenge possible. They do not stop crime. A policeman on the scene can stop a crime. A camera can't. And what is worse, most cameras are not actively monitored - they just pull the tapes after the event.
What was it about the cameras that made you feel safer? Did you feel ok knowing that if you were pushed under a train, they might catch the guy from the pictures? Did you feel safer because they might get a picture of the gook who blows up your platform ?
A police officer on the platform can help you. A camera can't.
I've lived in a number of places in London, and I've found two major things...
1. The cops rely on the cameras too much. If there is a glitch and they don't get footage, they don't seem to put much effort into old-school investigative techniques for most crimes (assault, muggings, vandalism). It's a case of "video or it didn't happen"
2. Yobs, drug dealers and thugs don't care about the cameras. I've had various run-ins with groups and individuals in full view of cameras and they've not been even slightly worried.
So I ask again... why did these cameras make you feel safe?
Its not going to make the country any safer, the police are still failing (due to no fault of their own). This is typical Blair policy, don't do anything that actually makes a difference - do something that looks like it should.
I have now seen one of these in a newspaper, I have one word: COOLNESS!
I bet all the police are fighting over who gets to use them.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
It's about control of people fucking with other people. It's that simple. The millions of cameras aren't a big deal - they're not in your home, they're not watching you take a shit, or commenting on your sex life. The cameras do help a great deal - even these much-maligned talking cameras help. I saw a show on TV where some guys were beating the shit out of some guy, and the camera operator spoke to them telling them they're on CCTV, that the cops have been called, that their descriptions have been taken, that footage has been made available to cops on the ground, and that they can try to run away, but they'll be followed through the city on CCTV until the cops feel their collars. Fair enough, they ran away, and the operator just switched cameras, saying "I'm still here... the cops are still after you...". The cops turned up, did an instant identity parade on the street (having the guys stand near a camera while the operator confirmed they were the ones involved in the fight. The footage was provided as evidence in court. I don't know how people can have a problem with that. If someone was beating me up, I'd like the attackers to be caught. I saw another example where one guy was mis-identified from the description given to the cops by the victim (again, of a street brawl) - the CCTV operator quickly informed the cops they had the wrong guy, and to keep looking. Without CCTV, that very well could have ended the search for the attacker, and caused an innocent person to spend a night in jail. It makes the cops more effective, and as long as we know they're enforcing laws people want them to enforce, that can't be a bad thing.
The cops are required, by law, to do what they can to catch the bad guys. If we are all harbouring paranoid delusions about what the police could get up to if they were evil, then the cops wouldn't be allowed cop cars, radios, batons, the power of arrest, police stations, clothes, anything. If we're worried about the laws being changed or interpreted in such a way as to hurt normal, moral, law-abiding folks, then we should concentrate our efforts on preventing that, not having some knee-jerk reaction to technology that's effectively used in ways we like "just in case". It's such a fucking lazy attitude to take with something so important as the safety of the people.
You can't control society by having society watch itself. You control it by enforcing the law, so control the law, and you control the people. The tools used to enforce the law are completely, 100% benign.
That's why we have the data protection act. You are legally allowed to request copies of any and all footage taken of you. As for who runs them, well in London (outside the square mile) it's the local authority (unless it's on private property, or the tube, in which case it's the owner of the property). In the square mile it's the City of London Police. And as for the quality of the footage, well it's getting better and better, and is regularly of suitable quality to gain a conviction on its own merits, obviously with someone pressing charges. Most of the newer equipment is broadcast-quality.
Do you find the number of cops on the street alarming and unsettling? If so maybe you should do some research into what they're up to, the laws they enforce, their powers and their motives. Allowing yourself to be freaked out, then refusing to actually get to the bottom of it, is quite frankly stupid.
Do you demand to see ID of anyone who looks at you in the street? Does the mere presence of other people on the street make you feel paranoid? If not, then you're scared of something other than being observed. You have no right to privacy in public (that's why there's a "private" and a "public").
So I was in my school's 6th form centre, just hanging around with some friends eating lunch. Went back upstairs, and one of my friends was pissed because someone stole his sandwich. Yup, he just put the sandwich down on a table, went into another room for a minute, came back and it was gone.
We were all clueless, and he was getting pretty pissed because none of us were admitting it (it wasn't us). So while we were making MY SANDWHICH jokes, he had to go to IT and check out the footage from the cameras, which completely identified the perpetrator.
(At this point I'll mention this is a private school who've done many things you'd cry about the police doing, like asking students - well, just me - to take down Youtube videos, but they've never abused the cameras)
Now don't get me wrong, it's true that a camera may not help in every situation. As mentioned in another post, it can help you identify the criminal, but that won't help if you're already dead. Point is, this does help with a hell of a lot of crimes, especially stealing and the like. And yeah, they could be abused, but so what? Law enforcement with guns have killed innocent people (I can name two UK examples), you don't see a huge campaign to disarm them. Innocent lives are worth a lot more than your embarrassment for doing something stupid.
Then will you FEEL safer?
They do make you safer. Pick-pockets are regularly caught by CCTV evidence, which means they are in prison and not able to pick-pocket you. They also allow people to recognise known criminals who have been banned from using the underground, and keep them out, also making you safer. The same goes for violent people, drunk people, and anything where someone does something illegal to someone else.
They can't catch that first offense, but they sure as hell can do a lot to stop that second one. It's the most basic of logic.
Actually, they do make you safer.
There's a control room in each station where all the cameras are continuously monitored. The last time I was in a station where something dodgy happened, I saw 10-12 staff and police running in from all directions within about 15 seconds.
For me, the scary thing is that there are some areas of some stations that *aren't* covered. That's just the tube though, and doesn't say anything about whether cameras in unsupervised areas do anything for safety...
Warning: May contain nuts
"I've also seen some pretty bad behaviour in front of CCTV cameras; I always think that if I were attacked, the grainy CCTV pictures shown on Crime Watch or in the paper would be of little comfort."
I actually WAS attacked right in front of a working CCTV camera. A fella tried to mug me right outside the front door of the building I worked at. The CCTV camera was mounted in front of the door, looking down the steps.
After I fought off the guy (a series of swift kicks to the nuts deters even the most determined attacker) he backed off, hurling abuse. It was at this point I pointed to the camera and said "Smile dickhead".
After calling the police, we tracked down the video and played it back. The quality was so poor you couldn't make out anyones features and the camera was on his face for a good 3 mins while he hurled abuse, at a distance of about 10 feet.
I'd always been suspicious of the effectiveness of CCTV footage, but after being asked by the Police Officer to drop it, as they had nothing to go on, I've never looked at CCTV cameras in the same way. The quality is poor for a reason. It's enough to identify a person from one camera location to another, but not of enough quality to identify someone perfectly. I'm almost certain that CCTV is purely for survelance and tracking, not fighting crime.
Yes, it is scary. There are lobby groups (I am a member of one) trying to raise public awareness and protect civil liberties, but most people here seem to have swallowed the "If you're doing nothing wrong you have nothing to fear" argument hook, line and sinker.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
> I would be EXTREMELY surprised if most government-purchased cameras were very good.
On a UK TV documentary I was watching a couple of nights ago I was very surprised with how good some of the cameras they were demoing actually were (real installed cameras in cities). They had an incredible level level of zoom and could zoom right in on someone's face from several hundred meters away. It was crystal clear - not like the blurry crap they seem to show on all those American street crime programs we seem to be importing at the moment. I'm guessing they were demoing the best cameras rather than the worst, but if many installed cameras are that good, then I wouldn't have thought the police would have too much difficulty securing a conviction if there was an attack/robbery/mugging etc within view of a camera. The high end cameras can also use microphones and 3D pattern recognition to identify the difference between say, a group of people smoking, and a group of people having a fight. It can then zoom in on the action automatically and also alert the control centre.
I know storage is a big problem with CCTV, but I've never really understood the point of camera systems that squeeze simultaneous 4 pictures onto one VHS video (which is already half broadcast resolution). It's not very easy to identify someone when you've got a blurry black and white 210 x 160 pixel video of someone. If you bear in mind a £99 ($200) hard disk recorder can record around 40 hours of broadcast quality TV it's hard to understand why people are still using video tape if they really think they might get robbed.
Except that the whole reason we're in this morass is that the majority of people seem to WANT the middle-grounders! The only way that a range of parties would end up in the Commons would be for the three (ok, 2.5) big ones to fragment into their various factions - at which point they'd all end up coalescing again to form governments and we'd be in a not entirely dissimilar position from now. And whilst having governments forced into stalemate by the death of a thousand compromises might be a good way to ensure that they don't do too much, what they do manage to agree on will end up being the lowest common denominator, ineffectual and/or populist - the very distinctiveness you're touting as a benefit of PR will be left at the doors of the Commons.
And of course, the most significant weakness of the present system - Parliamentary supremacy, which allows the executive to run amok without any legal responsibility whatsoever - would be left intact... and rendered virtually unchangeable.
What if you are doing an ugly fat chick, and you don't want anyone to know about it.
Those with the right connections and/or in a position of power get special treatment.
Being wealthy is probably highly correlated with having the right connections and being in a position of power:
- Connections are needed to get rich or are inherited along with the money ("daddy's friends", "my rich guys fratternity pals")
- Money enables power - in most societies money enables power simply because some of those which are in positions of power but are not wealthy are willing to be payed to exercise their power in specific ways.
However, money is not a pre-requisite for having connections or power: for example, many politicians are not rich.
In the end, the fact remains, that those which receive special treatment (let's call them, the elites) want to keep receiving special treatment and will do what it takes to make it be so (eg, remain an elite). This is pure human nature.
A common misconception (especially within a certain old-fashioned left) is that those which are not rich are inheritely better people and if they found themselfs in a positions of power/influence they would somehow behave differently from the current elites. Countless cases of ex-revolutionaries holding on to power (and the special treatment that comes with it) or previously "opressed" common workers which by luck or skill became bosses and turned into "oppressors" should have disavowed people of those notions.
It is what us brits desire. We don't have the same feelings towards our police officers as many Americans do, and our officers don't have the same feelings towards the general population as many American cops do, so we're generally more trusting when it comes to police powers and their associated technology. Looking at this from an American (or indeed any other country's) perspective is pretty silly. Our officers truly are public servants, there for the public good. They actively don't want to carry guns so that distinction isn't smudged.
Well, I just disagree that more diversity of parties would cause too much compromise; it would cause the right amount. If the government couldn't push through what it wanted, that's probably because what it wanted was very contraversial and probably crap. Take ID cards and road charging. I'd be very happy for the popular opinion to take precedence over the Labour cabinet's wishes there.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
All the Americans whining about the Freedom of Info Act would have a tantrum if they knew our gov't was photographing us 300x a day! Hey-if something happens and they're able to pin point who the perp was and bring about justice, then more power to them! Check out Christopher Ruddy
I'm sure most of the kids were pure as the driven snow.
That said, here in Atlanta the fashion is for young black men to go 'round in pants so loose they look like they're about to fall off. This is directly taken from the ill-fitting clothes provided to those in gaol. The desire is to emulate the local heroes, the local criminal class.
My point is that CCTV surveillence is influencing how the local "bad apples" dress. These "bad apples" are influencing the broader culture. This is not a happy development.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
"The individuals responsible", assuming they were what we were told they were, would have been killed in the attacks, one. Two, there was virtually NO surveillance footage of them, none. We've seen one grainy picture that looks either photoshopped or pixellated beyons any usefulness as evidence. Even the cameras on the No 30 bus were mysteriously inoperable on that day.
Once agains: there was NO surveillance footage. If you think you've seen any, you're imagining it. Propaganda does that to people.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
None, except for one grainy picture, totally unconvincing. That's what makes it more interesting - there SHOULD have been footage, but there wasn't any. I guess when the government engages in crime they know to disable the cameras first.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
Thank you and thank you profusely. Every time the subject comes up I've been saying the same thing. Whenever you hear "security", substitute "control" and you get a clearer picture.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
"Since when was it a right to not be seen in public? If you don't like being seen in public, then don't go out. Apart from criminals, who cares about being watched on CCTV?"
Remember that the people who own and operate CCTV are the same people who get to decide who is a criminal.
Also, "being seen" is really, really different from being watched all the time and having the data recorded. It always bugs me when slashbots yell "you have no expectation of privacy in public". Bull-shit. When you walk out onto a busy street, you are perfectly anonymous. You are seen, but you are still anonymous. Nobody knows who you are, where you've been, where you're going. CCTV cameras have the potential of stripping us of that anonymity.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
I don't know if it works, but nothing will if this doesnt. Tell them they are not the ones who determine whether or not they are doing anything illegal. As I wrote above, it's the owners of the surveillance systems who also get to decide who is a criminal.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
"Do you find the number of cops on the street alarming and unsettling?"
I, for one, do. And so would you if, like me, you had lived under a communist regime. Sometimes I think people in the West really lack imagination (some knowledge of history would help too, but imagination is perfectly sufficient). These days you can get shot dead on the Tube for lookiong vaguely like someone the police are looking for, and the killers get away scot-free. That one was a really good lesson. The people who put up CCTV to watch over you also have the legal right to kill you, even if you are innocent of any crime. Yes, I do find it unsettling.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
The British Home Office's own study shows that surveillance cameras haven't actually reduced crime, except in a few specific types of location - parking garages, for example. There are plenty of theories on why this is the case - police are watching specific areas from the station rather than patrolling everywhere - but at the end of the day, it's been shown that cameras just don't improve things.
At the same time, that same Home Office spends over 70% of its crime prevention budget on new surveillance cameras, and the government keeps telling us that we must have more cameras in order to keep us safe. This is clearly both dishonest and a misuse of public funds.
There's a pedestrian crossing near my house in Brighton which had its traffic lights "upgraded" last year; now it has six cameras and four motion detectors. For a simple pedestrian crossing, on a single straight road with plenty of visibility, no intersection with another road. Add in the fact that the pedestrian lights are shiny, new, and impossible for a pedestrian to see once (s)he's stepped into the road, and I get the feeling that the new kit was approved by a committee who got taken to a very nice dinner-and-titty-bar combo by the contractor.
Chuck Norris: Socialism == a thousand years of darkness.
"Funny how most people's beliefs end up making them look good."
The same goes for poor people. Are they poor because of a lack of hard work and determination? Or are they poor because the system is unfair? Which answer do you think most of them would give?
By the way, to whom is "the system" unfair?
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Good point, except that poor people stand to gain from not believing the myth, if the myth is not true. And if it is true, it still means having to stand up to an unfair system. It doesn't mean "I'll just stand around and bitch about it!" If you are poor, and there is an option, you have to take it. I may be wrong, but I have the impression that you have absolutely no idea what its like to be poor.
The system is unfair to people who are not members of the dominant culture. People who are members of the dominant culture never have to question their assumptions and cultural myths. When society says, "you can be anything you set your mind to" to a member of the dominant culture, that is likely true. When members of non dominant cultures are told that same myth, they are forced by experience to question that myth, as it is likely not true for them.
I've known lots of people who were smart, made good choices, worked hard, and didn't achieve anything. I've also known plenty of lazy bastards who thought they were smart and hard working, but weren't, and still got ahead through social connections and dumb luck. Members of the dominant culture who make it through dumb luck never have to question the story they are told, that they made it through skill and right choices.
No man is an island. We are all shaped by our experiences. We have little choice as to the kinds of experiences we will be shaped by. Society creates individuals and individuals create society. Individuals should be held responsible for the kinds of people they create through their interactions. Individualists somehow see themselves as separate from society and the systems they both help create and take advantage of. They are not, and such thinking is a huge abdication of personal responsibility.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
A couple points:
"Firstly, whether or not every waking moment of my day is observed or not, I may say whatever I damn well please."
You are probably one of the few with nothing to lose. You also still live in a relatively free nation, I assume, and are still somewhat secure that your constitutional rights will be upheld when you get the chance to argue in court. Now imagine that those rights didn't matter to those using the cameras who want to control the populace. What good are said rights when you chance of ever seeing the inside of the courtroom are at best 3 years away, if ever.
"Secondly, footage taken of you in your own home without warrant isn't admissable evidence, as per (my understand of) the Fourth Amendment."
Last I checked, the Fourth Amendment doesn't exist in the UK. Yes there are civil liberties there, but they aren't the same. Also, if the government does become corrupt, the ability to gather privately, to move semi-privately, may be the only way to restore justice. The reason there are civil liberties, like the Bill of Rights, is not because those rights weren't there before, its to keep those rights from being taken away. That is the same reason privacy needs to be protected now; not because the government is currently so corrupt it can't be trusted (somewhat arguable in the US right now...), but because we need to keep it from ever being taken away.
Clones are people two.
I mean really, does anyone think that making people safer is the actual purpose of these programs?
Especially given that way these cameras have a habit of breaking down when terrorists (be they "suicide bombers" or the Metropolitan Police) decide to attack Londoners.
I know, I know, never ascribe to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity, but millions of cameras, everyone photographed hundreds of times a day... Come on, who can believe that is about anything but control of society.
Control through fear. Since, as the Stasi discovered, such mass surveillance is utterly useless for most practical purposes. Even in cases where the people operating the cameras are not those who actually need to be spied upon in the first place.
Your point is what I'm talking about - a knee-jerk reaction, completely ignoring the evidence of reality. Britain is not a communist regime, and the people who put up the CCTV on the tube (and indeed the vast, vast majority of CCTV in the UK) are NOT the police. They get handed the evidence should the civilian operators record/see something that needs their attention. And the cops were not charged with the killing after an independent civilian investigation. There was a breakdown in the surveillance of the guy (funnily if there was better CCTV at De Menezes' house, he might still be alive today), which lead to his mis-identification. Couple that with some unfortunate accidental behaviour (apparent "dry cleaning", or moves to try and shake off people following him), and the seeds were sown for his very unfortunate demise. Do you think those same police would have been treated any better if they had found a suicide bomber and just let him on his way, to blow up a train full of folks? Would you be leading the chorus of cheers for them not risking killing one guy to save dozens and dozens?
If we all ran around scared of things communists/fascists/the french did that was bad, we'd not have any technology of any kind. Did you know the Romans had boats? Better get rid of the Navy! Did you know Hannibal used Elephants? Better blow up the zoo! Hitler had cars! Blow up VW! It's the only way to be sure! Seriously, I appreciate your worry, but try looking at things logically and rationally. We can have the best of both worlds if we approach technology with logic, and if we put in the safeguards to ensure it's not mis-used.
Do you find the number of cops on the street alarming and unsettling?
Quite a few of the people who find this number "alarming and unsettling" would actually like to see more uniformed police "on the streets".
These days you can get shot dead on the Tube for lookiong vaguely like someone the police are looking for, and the killers get away scot-free. That one was a really good lesson. The people who put up CCTV to watch over you also have the legal right to kill you, even if you are innocent of any crime. Yes, I do find it unsettling.
Not only did what amounts to a gang of thugs (the shooters wern't even wearing police uniforms) they also then lie about having "lost the tape".
Why would you have mass-protests for police entities procuring increasingly more technologically sophisticated equipment to do their jobs more effectively?
Because you also need suitable oversight to ensure that the police are doing their jobs effectivly at all. Whilst many tools could be used to make police more efficent. They can also be used for the police to waste their time not doing their jobs. "Inefficency" can often have the effect of keeping public servants focused on their job. e.g. if following people takes a lot of resources it won't be done for trivial reasons whereas if it is easy it will only be done for trivial reasons.
In a free society, the job of the policeman is not supposed to be an easy one.
Also if you make their job too easy (especially with the addition of such stupidity as "arrest quotas") how much effort would you expect them to put into daling with "real criminals".
A common misconception (especially within a certain old-fashioned left) is that those which are not rich are inheritely better people and if they found themselfs in a positions of power/influence they would somehow behave differently from the current elites. Countless cases of ex-revolutionaries holding on to power (and the special treatment that comes with it) or previously "opressed" common workers which by luck or skill became bosses and turned into "oppressors" should have disavowed people of those notions.
Hence "meet the new boss, same as the old boss". There's a Sci-Fi short story entitled "For the Duration" which covers this, though Orwell's "Animal Farm" is probably better known.
Sometimes you come across a situation where members of an "opressed group" have actually been kept away from positions of power because they are more likely to abuse them than anyone else.
> Remember that the people who own and operate CCTV are the
> same people who get to decide who is a criminal.
No. Only a jury decide that. Some security bloke sitting in an office somewhere cannot make me a criminal by just watching telly.
> Nobody knows who you are, where you've been, where you're going.
> CCTV cameras have the potential of stripping us of that anonymity.
No. CCTV will not tell anyone who I am (unless I'm wearing my name on my clothing in 6 inch high letters). Unless I commit a crime, there is negligible chance of anybody bothering to find out who I am just because I appeared on CCTV. You are anonymous right up until the moment you are forced to reveal your identity to a police officer who is arresting you for a crime that has been caught on camera. As you say, you are anonymous in public and there's nothing CCTV can do to change that unless they already have my face in their database from every angle AND they have a reason to bother to perform that search in the first place. Non criminals have nothing to fear.
Even if they DID somehow have a way to automatically work out who EVERYONE is and label their screens with little yellow ToolTips of our names, unless they ACT on that information or sell it to someone who will, then it still doesn't affect me at all and I couldn't care less. Unless you perform a crime while they're watching, they will not care who you are or what your name and address are.