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Pub Patrons Down Under Subject To Biometric Datamining
mask.of.sanity writes with an excerpt from ZDNet Australia: "Pubs and clubs in Australia are signing up in droves to national and state biometrics databases that capture patron fingerprints, photos, and scanned driver licenses in efforts to curb violence. The databases of captured patron information mean that individuals banned at one location could be refused entry across a string of venues. Particularly violent individuals could be banned for years. The databases are virtually free from government regulation as biometrics are not covered by privacy laws, meaning that the handling of details are left to the discretion of technology vendors."
This is a great idea!
A problem I've seen is people banned from pubs in one town simply moving on to drinking a little further away. It's too easy for them. A nationwide system would help. Those who only go out at night to harm should not be allowed out anywhere...
I would certainly be pleased to have to "sign in" to a pub if means nobody with me is going to randomly glassed or stabbed by someone out to cause trouble.
.. who dumps a bar manager and finds himself barred from every pub in the land with no right of appeal.
So pretty soon we'll have to use a mixture of disguises (including fingerprint covers or gloves) and opting out (not going to bars that do this).
Also:
The databases are virtually free from government regulation as biometrics are not covered by privacy laws, meaning that the handling of details are left to the discretion of technology vendors."
Yay free market! Praise be to Rand!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
this is like the shoplifting database in the USA. if you get a conviction for shoplifting there is a database that retailers check and they will refuse you employment based on it and possibly entry into their stores
Note to self: never go to Australia or any other Nanny State.
How is that a nanny state? It says that the databases AREN'T regulated by the state.
To summarise the summary of the summary: people are a problem. ~ h2g2
More and more, we dispense with privacy and freedom in the name of safety and security, although all of human history demonstrates we shall gain neither. There will always be violence, there will always be those who will take by force, and there will always be available to them the tools to commit these acts. Has everyone forgotten the cost of freedom? It is not limited to those casualties of past wars, honored though they may be, but includes the living accepting the chance of injury or death to preserve it. Why are we so willing to squander the chance to live, for fear of death? Each of us will surely die, yet so many seem so willing to quit living, for fear of it. Freedom is the chance to fail, the opportunity to make mistakes, it is by nature uncertain. If we are to maintain it, we must accept mistakes will be made and some will abuse it, be it a bar-room brawler or religious zealot. If we deny the chance of this, we've denied the possibility of success, as well.
And this is a bad thing?
Back in the UK, this story caused a lot of concern when it hit the main news.... So much for freedom loving UK.
http://www.croydonguardian.co.uk/news/4718624.Website_slams_bar_s_fingerprint_policy/?ref=mr
It's now becoming quite popular to want to scan / photograph people before going into night clubs, corresponding in less people going to said clubs and bars.
What the bar owners do with this data nobody knows, but I'm sure they would not miss a trick in selling it or giving it to criminals who want this data.
Take Nobody's Word For It.
Maybe those particularly violent should be in jail?
Australia's net censorship system is not going to happen. It was proposed, it was debated and in the end it went flat and Australia STILL has no filtering and less site takedowns than the US.
This pub thing is run by certain pubs themselves in order to keep violent patrons out of, it will probably be reviewed by the government if there are undue privacy issues, but this is not a government program, it is on private property, it is not wide spread and it is not mandatory that you drink in the places with this system.
What's your major issue with Australia anyway? The R rated games ban thing? If that's the biggest civil liberties issue in a country, it makes it pretty good by world standards.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
Anyone who's lived in Australia recently will now about the increasingly restrictive and puritanical direction our alcohol and pub/club licensing laws are going in. The usual reason brought up is the violence, which anecdotally and in my own experience is much worse than in similar places in Europe. However alcohol is seen as the cause of it all so law-abiding people get stung with sky-high alcohol prices (highest in the world outside the Nordic countries) and really restrictive door entry policies and closing hours.
If they setup some proper exclusion scheme to exclude violent people, with proper judicial oversight and judicial right of appeal - perhaps with tribunals similar to the industrial relations ones, we could stop the majority of the violence and do away with the puritanism.
Pre-canned Evolution Links for all those Slashdot holy wars.
I have always been an advocate of a really big wall around Australia
Do you think it's necessary? It seems to me there's already a really big moat around it.
I was told that I could not enter a pub in Worcester this spring as I was wearing a Tilly Hat. "Dress code" I asked? "No, we just need to be sure the CCTV gets good images of your face in case anything bad happens". This was not even a club per se, though they did have a DJ, there was no dance floor. I have heard there's live music club in Worcester that requires photos, but have not been there yet. I am not one of the - "if you have nothing to hide, why ask for privacy" lot, but on the other hand, if its a requirement of a venue, I'll follow it if I really want to be there.
Going on means going far
Going far means returning
If it is a life-long punishment, I'd say yes.
Not everyone who does a bad thing will continue doing it indefinitely. How many people do you know that have stolen some sweets from a store when they were younger, but wouldn't dream of doing it now?
Obviously, this can be counter-acted by a "lifetime" for the ban (so it expires after a few months on the first incident, few years on the second and never on the third, for example) or some way of getting removed from the list such as showing you have received help in curbing the behaviour.
The disappearing pencil trick. Let me show you it.
Isn't that what jails are for?
Take some guy who decides to go for a brawl in the US. There are a number of felony assault, assault and battery, malicious destruction, and criminal trespass charges that can be filed. If he fights back against the police, that would give more felonies. So, in theory, a brawler might be facing 20+ years if the judge decided to drop the hammer and have sentences serve consecutively.
This is why for the most part, brawls in the US are pretty rare.
I know! We'll infest the moat with sharks and crocodiles and poisinous jellyfish and deadly stingrays... oh wait.