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A Surveillance Camera On Every Chicago Street Corner?
Mike writes "Chicago Mayor Daley has stated that if his Olympic dreams come true, by 2016 there will be a surveillance camera on 'every street corner in Chicago.' Just like in London, elected officials all over America appear to be happily advancing a 'surveillance society' without regard for civil rights or privacy concerns. Ray Orozco, executive director of Chicago's Office of Emergency Management and Communications is quoted as saying, 'We're going to grow the system until we eventually cover one end of the city to the other.'"
Chicago has been developing its surveillance network for some time, but it seems they plan to continue increasing the scale.
Christ, they put those cameras in several years ago in the most high crime parts of Chicago. And you know what? They're still the most high crime parts of Chicago.
If you want crime to drop, give people a decent education, a decent job, and decent opportunity not to join a gang. And if you really want to increase enforcement, then stick a cop, not a camera, on every corner.
This is nothing more than "security theater" on a city-wide scale.
There is not a CCTV camera on every street in London.
But, who am I to burst your hyperbole bubble.
Full city coverage, yet whenever there is evidence of wrongdoing by a city official, or complaints over police behaviour, the footage mysteriously becomes 'unavailable', or the cameras weren't working that particular day.
Mother, do you think they'll like this sig?
In my casual reading of local crime cases, the majority of crimes solved rely on surveillance footage. I don't mind being filmed/monitored in any public space, and I vote.
Here's a neat idea. I really want to do the same with my license plate for the stupid redlight cameras in my city, but was thinking a few strong camera strobes with an IR filter set up as a slave flash would work better.
http://www.hacknmod.com/hack/blind-cameras-with-an-infrared-led-hat/
This IR hat hack is cool, but needs to be modified to regulate the current through the LEDs or they'll burn out quickly.
A camara that watches people is worthless unless there is someone to watch the camara output. Citywide survelliance for somewhere like Chicago would need thousands of people if it were to work.
That means an expensive workforce. This in turn means low wages, which means poor quality.
This would of course then be something a tech company will say they can do more efficiently and cheaply. The provided system will suck (unless AI has developed beyond our current abilities, and if it has, I missed a paper somewhere). The company will claim IP protection for their tech, and try to hide the snake oil nature of the code.
The result? an expensive but useless system kept in place to prevent the politicians who put them in from losing face (as in having to explain where those tens of millions of dollars went).
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
Any technology can be used effectively or not, it can be used for good or bad. Would you also say that they used armed officers in police cars with radios in the high crime parts of Chicago, so they should now use only unarmed cops on foot without radios in those areas?
That's a different dimension. You should do that *AND* have effective law enforcement.
Why not a cop watching ten cameras, one on each corner? Less expense, same results. Or perhaps better results, depending on the cops. A cop watching video screens cannot shoot first and ask questions later.
there can be an upside to this, if they record the video:
1. Somebody decides to payback a political enemy by releasing a video in the company of someone who is not their partner... (This is Chicago, after all)
2. The video is used in a case where the city is sued
The list could go on and on. Remember, every sword is dual edged.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
It's OK. Here in Chicago, the surveillance cameras will be coin-op. You can pay your bribe up front, saving on manpower.
I'll say one thing for this idea: at least cctv cameras can't torture suspects*
(* for the full story. google "Chicago Police Torture".)
You are welcome on my lawn.
This is not about crime.
This is a system for assisting in coordinating deployment of riot troops and other resources to control the population in an urban setting when things collapse. The government knows the path we are currently traveling will lead to societies' collapse and the revolt of the population against the government.
Heck, the FBI is already training first-responders now in dealing with IEDs, although they say "terrorist-planted IEDs" to cover their butts. If a road is well-traveled by law-abiding citizens (and a well-traveled road is the type that would be the best target), terrorists would find it extremely hard to plant roadside bombs without getting reported. So who do you think the government thinks will be planting IEDs?
http://www.upi.com/Emerging_Threats/2008/03/24/FBI_begins_IED_training/UPI-26431206400450/
Get ready for super-happy-fun-times.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
The cameras currently cover a very small part of the city. The stated goal of Daley is to cover the city in cameras. If a camera can only cover 50 yards, this means you need at least 1200 cameras per square mile. Keep in mind the city of Chicago is on the size of 227 square miles. Theoretically to blanket the city, you need at least 272,400 cameras. The city has at most 15,000 cameras at its disposal, so at best 5%. The camera network would have to be greatly expanded before there would be good coverage of the entire city. Also, remember the new cameras the city uses cost at least $5,000 each. (So adding another 100,000 cameras would cost 500 million dollars - that is just the physical cost of the cameras.) from http://www.smartcamerasblog.com/2009/02/surveillance-cameras-911/
So like this never happens huh?
Doesn't look like incarceration gonna work either.
http://www.reuters.com/article/wtMostRead/idUSTRE5190CB20090210
They Live, We Sleep
The primary purpose of the cameras is not for detection of crimes. It's to help investigate and prosecute reported crimes. For example, over the last several months there have been three women raped on their walk home from the el stop that my wife and I use. The victim accounts support the position that it's one guy, and the police have some grainy footage of him from a few security cameras, but they can't make out his face or figure out who he is.
Were this system in place, the job of catching the guy is likely to be a lot easier. I know that would make my wife and I feel a lot better about her safety. And personally, I don't see a problem with cameras in public places where you never had a reasonable expectation of privacy anyway. If they were invading my privacy I'd be the first to protest, but you can't claim to have privacy on a street corner.
Thanks, reading all about a Chicago police torture ring now.
http://www.chicagoreader.com/features/stories/andrewwilson/
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Did you wife start carrying a gun?
It's time we seriously considered two things -
Legalizing marijuana
Exiling violent offenders
To start, I'm not a fan of this surveillance society and I'd oppose this if it ever came to my town.
Having said that, I'm somewhat puzzled by the claims that this would violate privacy. There is no privacy in public. The street corners and intersections are simply not private.
There is a bizarre misuse of the word which seems to stem from the belief anything you do, regardless of where you do it, is private unless you want other people to know about it. It does not make any sense.
i was watching the early news this morning (ABC7) and the ultimate plan is to tie them into private cctv surveillance for use with first responders and such. i got the feeling it is more for intel on in-progress crimes than actually watching (spying) on us poor slobs. the Chicago Police have had some success lately with using these cctv's to ID suspects after the fact. cctv proliferation in Waukegan is picking up, both in public and private areas of town. Waukegan and Chicago have way bigger problems than can be fixed with some cctv surveillance.
"You can kill the revolutionary, but you can't kill the revolution."-- Fred Hampton
I have a suggestion to both make those cameras cost effective and remove the Big Brother onus from them at the same time: make their use democratic rather than autocratic. Have you ever heard of Neighborhood Watch? Perhaps you don't have such efforts in the U.K.?
The correct use of those cameras is to wire them up to the Internet, and make it so that ANY concerned citizen can monitor the cameras in a Web browser, or perhaps a dedicated app. Leave it up to concerned citizens watching a camera to call the police and report what they have observed. Best of all, give them a tool - Firefox extension? - that lets them record what they're viewing, so they have some form of evidence to give police, not just hearsay.
That approach would incur no additional municipal cost for monitoring, and any misuse of the cameras would be the responsibility of individual citizens, not Big Brother. Would citizens actually do it? I think they would, in high-crime areas or areas where crime is rising.
There is no expectation of privacy when one is walking down the street or driving on a public road.There is also no right not to be studied in close detail by either the government of private citizens.
I'm certain that cameras will not stop abnormal criminals from committing crimes but criminals with somewhat normal minds that have any hope of a future will surely curtail their crimes when cameras dominate an area.
The correct use of those cameras is to wire them up to the Internet, and make it so that ANY concerned citizen can monitor the cameras in a Web browser, or perhaps a dedicated app. Leave it up to concerned citizens watching a camera to call the police and report what they have observed. Best of all, give them a tool - Firefox extension? - that lets them record what they're viewing, so they have some form of evidence to give police, not just hearsay.
In the United States we have Neighborhood Watch groups, many of which would no doubt find cameras on every street invaluable: they could sit home warm in their jammies and still help keep their neighborhood safe, instead of being out roaming the streets in the harsh cold with the crooks, risking being shot-at.
That approach would incur no additional municipal cost for monitoring, and any misuse of the cameras would be the responsibility of individual citizens, not Big Brother. Would citizens actually do it? I think they would, in high-crime areas or areas where crime is rising. That approach would be democratic, rather than autocratic.
The solution is vandalism. Vandalism and destruction of city property are misdemeanors, and most people won't get caught. These cameras should be vandalized at every opportunity in every city.
You know those big, clearly-visible CCTV cameras on poles? They're dummies. You can knock the shit out of it all you want, the real camera is tiny and is filming you doing it.
Sunglasses 24 hours a day and large brimmed hats pulled down low.
Never answer an anonymous letter. - Yogi Berra
You have no expectation of privacy on a public street. Why should you?
Trying to create such a right to privacy on public streets would be quite harmful to the interests of citizens in a democracy; we want to be able to record, document, and share what happens in public.
The real problem with surveillance cameras is that they are not public, so the police can use them against you, but you may not be able to use them against the police or government. Video from surveillance cameras should be publicly accessible by everybody.
LOL... that's awesome. If his Olympic dreams come true...? Let's get real here shall we? Whether or not those Olympic dreams come true, Mayor Daley will implement the cameras anyway. That level of control is something he's always craved. It's only a matter of time before this surveillance is extended to microphones (at least) in every living room.
Sorry, I frequented Chicago as a tourist for years until Daley killed Meigs airport... then we saw the reality of the control freak he is. The only time I've been there since has been on business... I'll take my tourism dollars somewhere slightly less corrupt. Like Mexico... ;)
Daley is the epitome of the corrupt politician, just like his father was. He's one of the primary reasons I never moved to Chicago.
If you look around nearly every corner has one or ore camera pointed at it.
They may be 'private' but they are still there, and the images can fall into government hands rather easily.
Remember the tracking of that one 9/11 terrorist they showed on TV again and again.. from bank machine cameras, cameras at gas stations..etc? Its already there, just moves like this make it more public.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
It all depends on what the true intent is. And ill give you a hint: its not really about preventing crime.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I prefer not to feed the trolls, but this is a meme that I see more and more on here.
Where are you going to exile your violent offenders to? What makes you think anyone else wants to deal with those people you have deemed too far gone to be redeemed?
Do they not notice the crime rates?
We've got buses and train tracks falling apart, we have to beg the state and even federal government for money so that the public transit system doesn't completely shut down and the city with it - but hey! Clearly what the Olympic committee wants to see isn't a CTA that can actually handle the number of tourists required for this event - no no, I'm sure what they really want is a promise to pretend to prevent crime.
I am so glad I'll only be living in this city for a couple more years. There are some really good things about it, but they're not anything that can't be found in any reasonably-sized city.
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
I'll bite.
Exile them to where, exactly?
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
It is dominance and control. Not of crime, but of the population at large.
It's time we seriously considered two things - Legalizing marijuana
I suggest legalizing all drugs to adults, because an adult person should have the right to consume whatever she wants as long as she does it in her own privacy without interfering with others. I do find it acceptable for the government to revoke health insurance of notorious substance abusers (including smokers and alcoholics), however.
Exiling violent offenders
There is no place to exile them to, I'm afraid. But I believe that incorrigible criminals should be executed.
I prefer not to feed the trolls, but this is a meme that I see more and more on here.
Is everybody who doesn't share your views a troll?
If they ever put up cameras wherever I live, then I will just start wearing a mask, everywhere I go, and then randomly switch them out and trade with other people at random points in my trip. That should keep them confused.
Isn't this why Australia exists?
Everything in your post is wrong. The simple knowledge that someone is armed is enough to prevent the attempt to rape or rob or whatever. Will it stop everyone? No. Will it stop most of them? Yes. Just like the victim in your example who would rather give up his wallet than get shot, a robber will not take the chance of robbing an armed man. Perhaps you should research why North Dakota has very few firearm restrictions and only had two homicides last year? (Both stabbings.)
I do find it acceptable for the government to revoke health insurance of notorious substance abusers (including smokers and alcoholics), however.
You kidding? those are the guys who actually need it more. The onlyproblem is that only the consecuences are usually treated, not the root problems.
DON'T PANIC.
http://www.reuters.com/article/wtMostRead/idUSTRE5190CB20090210
And guess who's going to be released? Violent criminals because those in prison for nonviolent drug offenses have minimum sentences. A good way to relieve the prison population, and the United States has the highest prison population in the world, is by freeing those in prison for nonviolent drugs offenses. Get rid of victim-less crimes such as the drug laws and the prison population can be cut by more than half [pdf warning].
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I do find it acceptable for the government to revoke health insurance of notorious substance abusers (including smokers and alcoholics)
Government should only be issuing health insurance as the last effort when a free market fails. And no it hasn't already failed, there is no free market in healthcare.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I do find it acceptable for the government to revoke health insurance of notorious substance abusers (including smokers and alcoholics), however.
You kidding? those are the guys who actually need it more. The onlyproblem is that only the consecuences are usually treated, not the root problems.
I'm not kidding. If you crash your car or set your house on fire deliberately, the insurance company will rightfully refuse to pay you a penny. Why should health insurance be any different? Mind you, I'm not suggesting that health care should be denied to junkies, only that they should pay for it themselves.
Freedom and responsibility are two faces of the same coin. They don't exist without each other.
The government, in typical UK style, decreed that cameras would make use safer, but declined to provide sufficient funding.
No, they failed to provide sufficient evidence that it would work. It was a bee up someone's ass, a lot of money was spent install them, and now they have nothing but a huge, expensive, ineffective mess. Looks like the bee has made its way to Chicago. The same, horrible waste of money will happen all over again.
negligable, barely noticable, if it exists at all. The loss to our pocket through wasted taxes? Millions, and thats far worse.
Ah but there was a loss of freedom. Because money was taken from your pockets you couldn't do what you wanted with that money.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Agreed about the waste of tax money.
The money wasted was a loss of freedom.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
If you set your own house on fire deliberately and try to cash the insurance money, you're commiting a fraud.
However, if you are a notorius substance abuser, you most likely have a psychological problem behind it. You need medical help both for the consecuences of said substance abuse _and_ your mind problems, that's why I said that they need it more.
I may be wrong.
DON'T PANIC.
Canada. Everyone know's it is their fault anyways.
I kid, I kid...
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
If you set your own house on fire deliberately and try to cash the insurance money, you're commiting a fraud.
However, if you are a notorius substance abuser, you most likely have a psychological problem behind it. You need medical help both for the consecuences of said substance abuse _and_ your mind problems, that's why I said that they need it more.
Maybe so, but we could discuss what is the difference between free will and mental disorder. Where do we draw the line?
Take me as an example. I'm mildly overweight and absolutely don't care about being fit. Should I be given psychological help at somebody else's expense?
I may be wrong.
Same here.
Maybe so, but we could discuss what is the difference between free will and mental disorder. Where do we draw the line?
That's a pretty good point. Is having an auto-destructive personality a disease or just free will is something I don't have the information/training to determine, I think it could be something a profesional have to determine in a person basis. Determining what actually is a "normal and healthy" psique is seems to be heavily debated.
Take me as an example. I'm mildly overweight and absolutely don't care about being fit. Should I be given psychological help at somebody else's expense?
Well, if being mildly overweigth brings you aditional problems like self-steem issues, hearth problems, etc. (just heavy smokers have respirational problems, heavy drinkers have liber problems, junkies have... well health problems. That being the original scope 5 posts ago) then yes, go ahead and get psychological help with your medical insurance. If not, then being mildy overweigth is not being a problem, just like using drugs in a truly recreational way.
DON'T PANIC.
No, this is why Australia exists - but isn't it worth asking where the Aborigines should exile their criminals to?
"Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
We already have a policy in place for legal, recreational drug use: alcohol.
You can buy and use as much as you want, do it at home or at a bar, but you can't drive on it. And if you do something stupid under the influence, you generally face the same penalties as if you'd done it sober. I don't know how insurance companies treat alcoholics, but as long as healthcare remains privatized, they are free to cover whomever they wish (to an extent... no racism, sexism, that kind of thing) and the government doesn't much have a say in it. Now if we go to national healthcare that'd be different.
There is no reason to think we couldn't legalize other drugs and treat them the same way. In some ways I think highly addictive drugs should be made illegal, but on the other hand, an adult should be allowed to do what they want. And hell, cigarettes are legal. But I think it's easy for a drug dealer to abuse addictive substances by getting unwitting victims hooked, so perhaps there should be some regulation. But not for pot, of course.
The path to enlightenment is truly through homemade drugs!
Judging by national headlines and hot items on the evening news, it isn't the streets of Chicago that need cameras that look for "suspicious activity" - they're needed in the backrooms and bars the elected officials of Chicago and Illinois in general hang out in.
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
In Chicago there should be a surveillance camera in every politician's office.
Greetings,
Open Systems in Technology are not limited to computer systems. Public money spent on public surveillance is just like any other public expenditure, subject to the inspection of those that purchased it.
If a mother want to know that her son is at the playground he said he was going to, why can't she tune in to the camera over the web and see it?
Several years ago the Barre Open Systems Institute (bosivt.org) here in Vermont presented this paper (http://docbox.flint.com/~flint/barre/Barre_Public_Video_Policy_Draft_v01.pdf) to the Barre city fathers. This policy draft may help shape policy in Chicago, and is released under GPL V1.
Regards,
Flint
BOSIVt.org
I dunno about the rest of you but this is one more stick of wood in the civil war fire that is slowly burning through out this country. Loss of jobs, loss of housing and now more loss of privacy, when does it end.
"The Brady Bunch is back...working homicide"
In some ways I think highly addictive drugs should be made illegal, but on the other hand, an adult should be allowed to do what they want.
There probably arn't that many drugs which are so dangerous that prohibition is the better option. Even the most addictive drug sold legally at whatever cost legal business can make a profit is unlikely to be as much of a problem than a black market with well armed criminal gangs.
Frankly, I don't think junkies are more likely, per se to have health problems. There is not a slither of medical evidence for opiates or cannabinoids. And most (all?) stimulants are less problematic than overdoing it on caffeine (face it, if that was truly dangerous, slashdot would cease to exist in short order).
I know tobacco is bad for you, so I smoke weed with crack.
US Army? After all the US Army has a stellar record of violence and brutality at times.
These "exiles" will feel right at home.
Plus, the US Army contract will force them to serve until they retire, or kicked out, or killed in Afghanistan/Iraq/Venezeuala/Iran/China (whichever country at the moment USA is fighting).
Add to that the fact that the US Army is indeed willing to accept criminals, it makes all the more a good thing.
We get rid of a few killers, the army benefits by them, and the country at receiving end will rue its day.
"Doing what i can, with what i have." ~ Burt Gummer
Checked the basement of some of our fellow /.'s yet ? ;)
comeon, confess, most of you got atleast something older than a 8086 lying around "as junk"..
--- I am known for the ones who want to find me on the net. Is that a privacy risk or a privilege? One might wonder..
Excellent point. To continue on my point, the rebuttal to my post uses the legal sense of "expectation of privacy". But there is a big difference between that and peoples' expectation of privacy. For example, someone with a extremely sensitive sense of smell than humans currently have, might be able to detect a variety of medical conditions, sexual excitement, what your diet is, and perhaps get a crude idea of where a person has been, just from the smell of a person. We wash ourselves and our clothes, wear deorderant, etc precisely so that people can't smell us. But there's no legal constraint keeping someone from smelling that you are say, diabetic or just had sex recently.
probably most drug dealers wouldn't pay off the cops
Last time I checked the biggest drug dealers in the world have indeed paid for laws that say their mood elevators are legal (xanax, zoloft, prozac) and yours are not (weed, chronic, kine).
So not only would they pay, they have paid already. And now the cops enforce laws that work against the stability of society instead of promoting it.