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Homeland Security's Tech Wonders
Lucas123 writes "The multi-billion dollar budget of the Department of Homeland Security has spawned a myriad of new, whiz-bang technology that includes things like keychain-size, remote-controlled aerial vehicles designed to collect and transmit data for military and homeland security uses. It also includes infrared cameras that capture license plate images to match them in milliseconds to police records. "Seventy percent of all criminal activity can be tied to a vehicle," says Mark Windover, president of Remington ELSAG Law Enforcement Systems, which is marketing its product to 250 U.S. police agencies."
Now we will see crime drop just like it did in the UK when they installed their cameras!
"Seventy percent of all criminal activity can be tied to a vehicle,"
The occupant of Air force one ?
It also includes infrared cameras that capture license plate images to match them in milliseconds to police records.
The CAPTCHA's are getting so damned difficult to decipher that I can hardly even sign up for anonymous email accounts or download pr0n anymore.
How is stuff like correlating license plates to crime, or flying small recon drones around, helping catch terrorists? According to the Director of National Intelligence, Michael McConnell, the best thing Washington could have done to prevent the terrorist attacks in new york was to have listened to FBI agents when they repeatedly warned that Zacarias Moussaoui was acting suspiciously, and repeatedly requested search warrants (http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/Story?id=3621517&page=1 .) Homeland security should be doing research about how to prevent bureaucratic incompetance.
But where does one direct all this "wonderful" technology? There is a myth that seems to infest these new fangled security organisations, that if only they can gather sufficient data they will be able to identify and prevent bad things happening. They cannot, but are willing to spend huge amounts of money in the attempt.
It looks like the same track is being followed as in the United Kingdom, where we host the world's largest collection of CCTV cameras, not to mention cameras to catch speeding motorists, read registration plates, etc. Whilst it may give a nice warm glow of reassurance to those who believe the propaganda, does all this gadgetry do anything to reduce the amount of crime as opposed to the fear thereof? Not really: CCTV cameras, for example, have blind spots in their coverage. Technology is being used as a fig-leaf to cover the fact that the powers that be cannot or will not use the presence of humans patrolling in uniforms as a means of catching or deterring ne'er do wells. Technological fixes seem to be preferred too since they do not require wages, meal breaks, holidays or other such luxuries which drain the public purse.
"usage: Recent criticism of the use of myriad as a noun, both in the plural form myriads and in the phrase a myriad of, seems to reflect a mistaken belief that the word was originally and is still properly only an adjective. As the entries here show, however, the noun is in fact the older form, dating to the 16th century. The noun myriad has appeared in the works of such writers as Milton (plural myriads) and Thoreau (a myriad of), and it continues to occur frequently in reputable English. There is no reason to avoid it."
http://m-w.com/dictionary/myriad (Definition of myriad from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary)
A problem with information on 'the Internets' is that there are chances that the quality of the sources are not always properly assessed.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
I say we go with "plethora" or "vast cornucopia" instead.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Seems to me that it isn't the huge budget of the department of homeland security that's pushing these innovations, it's DARPA, the same group that has been pushing everything from AI (with cool desert races) to the internet.....
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
Probably that means they should be spying upon themselves more. That way, if an agent figures out something useful maybe someone in another agency will learn about it and be able to make use of it. At least they won't need to worry about lack of inter-agency cooperation and all that.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Homeland security should be doing research about how to prevent bureaucratic incompetance.
I like this sentence. It sends me into a trance every time I read it. I think it is because I imagine the DHS trying to perform this research and ironically getting nowhere. Then they try to research why their previous research got nowhere. When that gets nowhere they decide to research why the research of why their previous research got nowhere got nowhere and so on.
Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammar_Nazi
This comment is fully compliant with RFC 527.
Pop quiz, in the USofA are there:
#1. More terrorists?
#2. More crooked cops?
Now, which of these is this new surveillance technology supposed to protect you from and which ones will have it?
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/conductunbecoming/
The companies making the products often hire politicians who voted to purchase those products to fight [crime|terrorism|kiddie_porn].
It's all an incestuous cycle.
It IS a noun. It is also an adjective. Please check your facts before trying to correct others.
/mrid/ [mir-ee-uhd]
myriad
-noun
1. a very great or indefinitely great number of persons or things.
2. ten thousand.
-adjective
3. of an indefinitely great number; innumerable: the myriad stars of a summer night.
4. having innumerable phases, aspects, variations, etc.: the myriad mind of Shakespeare.
5. ten thousand.
Origin: 1545-55; Gk myriad- (s. of myriás) ten thousand; see -ad1
Also interesting:
Usage Note: Throughout most of its history in English myriad was used as a noun, as in a myriad of men. In the 19th century it began to be used in poetry as an adjective, as in myriad men. Both usages in English are acceptable, as in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Myriad myriads of lives." This poetic, adjectival use became so well entrenched generally that many people came to consider it as the only correct use. In fact, both uses in English are parallel with those of the original ancient Greek. The Greek word mrias, from which myriad derives, could be used as either a noun or an adjective, but the noun mrias was used in general prose and in mathematics while the adjective mrias was used only in poetry.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Do you want to know what it is being used for? I'll tell you, revenue generation. The city of Providnce, RI recently changes the rules regarding parking tickets. It used to be that if you had five or more you might find your car booted. Now it's two tickets and it's not the police doing the booting, but a private company.
I've seen the vehicle, it's a mini-van with cameras mounted at the top of both A pillars and pointing outward and a little above curb level. When they spot a vehicle the put on a boot with a keypad. To get the boot off you have to call the 800 number, pay on average $350 then remove the boot and return it to the police department.
The other little thing that went into effect were tons of new parking meters. The one thing right about that is the kiosk system, no individual meters. It prints a ticket that you place in your car. And it takes credit cards. The kiosk is also run via solar power and uses a MESH network connection.
So not all those technologies are used to spy per se, but as revenue generation tools.
"A myriad" can refer to a very small myriad. As in,
"All this expensive crap has a myriad of uses compared to good old fashioned police work."
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
All for the low, low price of your personal freedoms!
Hey, it took millions of Egyptians to built the Great Myriads, and if they want to noun them thats there write.
The question is who is policing the police?
Remember, George Washington and our founding fathers were considered terrorists.
Well, if current trends in surveillance and invasive micro-management of society continue, at some point an enemy state wouldn't need to go to war to take us over. They'd just replace a few key button pushers and we'd be pwned.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Problem is, toys can't replace common sense or good old walking the beat crime fighting. Besides, many more people get killed in a month from car accidents then all that got killed on 9/11. I'll also bet that property damage in a year from those accidents far exceeds the property damage done on 9/11. Yet we spend BILLIONS on terrorism, and practicallly nothing on making cars safer (in fact, the cars of today are less safe-look at how well the bumpers don't work on new cars). Or, look at health insurance. If they put those billions into making sure the 30 million uninsured people in this country had health care, many more people would live then died on 9/11. Look, I'm not trying to devalue what happened on 9/11. It was terrible! BUT our priorities are really f**ked up! The military can't fix the big problems in this country. We need to use our money on basics, not toys! I don't know about you, but my money pays for food and lodging for my family before I buy a wide screen TV with it. Of course, Halliburton isn't in the health care business either.
I'd like to how these companies and agencies react when hardware blueprints and software source code for their (very likely) proprietary products get subpoenaed by tech savvy defense lawyers. A reasonable court* would hold that a defendant has a right to examine the devices for his defense. Neither state secrets nor trade secrets will (given a reasonable court*) be a justification to hide the proprietary bits.
Since I expect neither the companies nor the government will be too keen on letting such material be examined in court, the combination of reasonable courts* and a tech savvy defense will greatly limit the applicability of this technology to law enforcement. Or, perhaps, people will realize that any hardware and software used by the government, particularly for law enforcement purposes, must be open public examination.
--sabre86
*Reasonable courts do exist, right? Please.
then we will all be free.
Five hours later, two very skilled hackers attempted to circumvent my firewall and gain access to my computer here at home.
There were actually three of us assigned to your case. My colleagues were purposely "noisy" with their attempts so that your attention would be focused in their direction while I did my work.
12 years I've been doing this, nobody attempted a hack of this skill against me.
Puhleeeeze! Your home PC isn't exactly Fort Knox. Even a Linksys router running dd-wrt would have given me more resistance than your machine.
While planting some files on your hard drive, I noticed that you downloaded TrueCrypt but never bothered to install it. Tsk, tsk. I altered a few Word docs on your hard drive and then added some pics to existing directories on your PC that that will definitely get your photo into the local newspapers. Expect a knock at the door in three...two...one...
Thank you for shopping at DHS-mart.
-Talon
Ow! I have found it best not to nitpick grammar and spelling on Slashdot. There are plenty of folks here who are very intelligent and be's not the bestest fo speelers or grammaticistists. I think it's best to judge the content not the occasional misuse of a word or spelling. Also, some of the world's best educated in English seem to peruse Slashdot and they WILL hold you to your own standards and put you in your place if you try to be a grammar Nazi and you are actually...WRONG! That is part of the evolution of my sig. :)
I reserve the right to think for myself. Others' opinions are optional. Puppy on lap = typos...not illiteracy.
I can feel safer now that we have so many new surveilance devices keeping an eye on the general population.
Oh, where's Osama bin Laden right now, you see him with that stuff? No? Hmm, I think this is turning out to be like the Hubbel telescope -- it's great stuff and cost bundles, but the lens is pointed in the WRONG F@#%(&*# DIRECTION!!
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
Sounds almost like a get-smart episode.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
My source, the Liddel & Scott Greek Lexicon ...
Not knowing the relative authority of either source, the one about modern English trumps the one about ancient Greek in my book.
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
Let's also discuss the modern safety features that you have cited. The GP was comparing Department of Homeland Security anti-terrorist spending to govermental spending on improving auto safety. You responded by listing a number of safety improvements that have been brought about by market pressures and competition amongst automakers. These are wonderful improvements that have nothing to do governmental regulation and spending, IIRC. Seatbelts are an example of government-mandated safety equiptment, none of the items that you mention (possible exception of airbags in new cars??) are required by law.
\/\/oobie
Don't worry. With the increased number of political appointments instead of by merit we've got the bureaucratic incompetance situation at an entirely new level. Soon we'll have world's best practice in bureaucratic incompetance instead of being left behind in this area by the top performers in the third world. Forget study and hard work - join the party comrade!
I'm never going to bother to spellcheck a slashdot post and neither are a lot of people. It really doesn't matter unless it changes the meaning of things.
Problem - Solution:
Overbearing satellites - sombrero
Nanohelicopters - fly swatter
Towers, sensors and radar - pantomime horse outfit
Ranged finger and iris scans - sunglasses and gloves
One step solution: Pantomime horse wearing sunglasses, gloves and a sombrero carrying a fly swatter.
This is tyranny.
so the police can stay at their office in good and relax while watching the crime would happen and eating popcorn. i think the police will get more fatter and lazy :D
"Thank you for shopping at DHS-mart."
It should be "Shop Smart, Shop DHS-Mart!"
There are no loopholes. It's either legal or it's not.
They'd receive a mangled wheel lock back that they have photo evidence of being attached to your car, with a matching serial number on the lock. They'll have your licence plate and so they'll know who/where you are. They'd bill you for a new one, and maybe prosecute for damage.
Hail Orwell !!
Hold on a second; what percent of criminal activity is related to Homeland Security? I'll bet it's very low. Now cut that to 70%.
The Department of Homeland Security Mission Statement says:
The DHS constantly oversteps its bounds and infringes on our personal freedom. We must not fall victim to Big Brother tactics.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
having small gadgets to help in keeping crimes at bay..that's technology being used to the fullest. is it really, now? more like being phobic and hiding behind all the reasons they can come out with just to get the approval of the public. typical.
"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe."
When human solved the problems. Another human will break the rules of the problems. So, no problems and solutions for the problems will be subroutine in our life freely.
Plus since so many people now drive SUVs the safety factor is gone since now it one SUV hitting another.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
I did take three years of ancient Greek
... perhaps this was enough to learn that the connotation of 'idiot' shifted a little since ancient Greek was the language of choice in Greece, whilst it obviously was of not so much help with regard to the noun in question.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
The footage was from CNN, not Fox
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