Slashdot Mirror
Citizens Spy On Big Brother
An anonymous reader writes "Citizens of the world are striking back at 24/7 state surveillance by pulling out their cameraphones and filming inept officials, deadly healthcare lapses and thuggish cops. So-called Sous-veillance is seeing more and more people posting damning footage of official misdemenours to sites such as YouTube to shame them into action." I wonder what happens if you inform a cop that you are recording him when he pulls you over.
That's why you use two cameras. One to point out that you are recording, and a hidden one to record the ensuing hijinks.
You get arrested under shiny new terrorism laws, eg:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06/24/bus_spotter_clampdown/
I was catching a bus from Walthamstow Bus Station, part of a busy transport interchange in East London. On my way I saw the police kicking the living crap out of someone. I went up to start filming, and was told by a "Community Support" officer not to take pictures. I asked what law I was violating, and was met with the witty answer of "the law that says you can't film that over there". Right then. Seeing no point in continuing this conversation while the man continued to be smashed around by the Metropolitan Police, I went to the other side of a toughened glass barrier, stood on some chairs and started filming from there. It was at this point that I was grabbed by two officers and stopped and searched under the terrorism act, 2004. Unfortunately, as I shut the shutter on my K800i, all footage was lost :(
They're actually allowed to arbitrarily search anyone in London under this law, arbitrarily, as it's designated a zone of terrorist threat or somesuch. The mistake the officer searching me (whos full details I do have) claimed that I had been filming covertly. Standing on a chair holding a camera above my head, I'd not felt this to be covert, so I submitted the "stop and account" slip to the Independent Police Complaints Commission, who handed the investigation back to the local force, who stalled the investigation for long enough that the CCTV had been erased!
The rest is history, I'm afraid. There are wranglings going on with my MP regarding this, but should I be in such a position again I'll be damn sure to make certain that the footage is saved.
Dallas SWAT has been raiding poker games. Drew Carey covered this at http://www.reason.tv/video/show/172.html.
When one of the defendants subpoenaed copies of the video tapes made
of the raid -- the reality show "Dallas SWAT" had filmed it -- he was
told that no copies of the tapes existed. See http://www.theagitator.com/2007/04/20/tales-of-a-dallas-poker-raid/
In Oceania, members of the Inner Party were allowed to turn off their
telescreens.
My uncle was a sheriff for many years, (just retired) and I asked him what is was like dealing every day with people giving you shit, hating you, spitting at you, calling you names, etc..
He told me it didn't bother him much, it was just a part of the job, and that assholes will always be assholes. The part of his job he hated was the psuedo "victims". IE, you're called to a house for the 3rd time that month for domestic violence, and the woman wants YOU to stop the man from beating her, cause she's a victim. Of course, she would always go back to the same guy, and a few weeks later, the whole cycle would repeat. He really hated those situations, or any domestic violence, because you have so much emotional crap you have to deal with as a cop on the call.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Nope. I tried to become a police officer. Took the courses at school and took the test. Know what I was told (long after the fact, by someone inside)? I scored too high on the intelligence test.
Turns out you have to have the right combination of stupid and submissive to the rule of law to become a police officer.
I had a hard time believing it, so I spoke with the chief. Turns out it is true. People who test too high have a tendency to move on to other things after a few years, costing the city too much money. Their best catch is the guy that's not quite smart enough to make something of himself but not so dumb that he trips over his own feet.
Public use of any portable music system is a virtually guaranteed indicator of sociopathic tendencies. -- Zoso
You certainly need a hidden camera. If you inform them of your camera (or it's obvious), then as others have stated, it'll probably get smashed and any recordings destroyed. And if they were already doing something wrong, if they destroy your camera, then they're probably about to do something a lot more wrong to you.
On my street (not a particularly good part of town; old, blue-collar, and multi-ethnic, though not particularly run-down or dangerous) the cops came to arrest someone, and when they got him out of his house, he was making some noises about resisting arrest and being somewhat disorderly. If I were a cop, I'd certainly have been prepared for trouble, the way he was acting. But one of the cops came over and told everyone who had gathered on the opposing sidewalk, about 30 feet away, that we had to disperse and couldn't watch. My landlord argued with him, asking why he couldn't stand on a public sidewalk near his house, well away from what was going on, and watch what happened in his neighborhood. The cop told him that if he didn't walk out of viewing distance, they'd arrest him. The cop said it was for the privacy of the person being arrested. Yea, right. The cops didn't want any witnesses around before they went to town on this guy. First person experience.
Even when the cops have been required by law to keep everything on camera and keep the footage, they'll still go turn the camera off illegally and beat the #*$ out of someone. Who's going to arrest them, they're a cop? More info on that one here At least the cop was fired, eventually, but not prosecuted or anything. He's appealing the decision.
Although sometimes, they don't destroy the evidence. And other times, people do get away with videos of cops being idiots unmolested.
And this guy has a whole series of videos he posts online catching cops doing illegal things. I wonder how long until he get his camera confiscated and nasty things happen to him off film? Also, see this.
Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
Authoritarianism is just what happens when some people think that they know what's best for everyone. Censorship and spying are parts of this.
But for many people, it's less about the authority than about the 'standing up' part. People who lack self-confidence aren't going to stand up to a pushy government, or anyone, because they're scared. As a result, when someone *does* stand up, it shames those who didn't, and they resent that person. This has been called crab mentality: the idea that a crab trying to escape from a bucket is pulled back by its fellow crabs.
At its base, authoritarianism is strongly related to insecurity. My point is just that many people encourage this (actively or passively) through fear and cognitive dissonance, not malice.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.