Slashdot Mirror
City Council Ordered To Stop CCTV In Taxi Cabs
judgecorp writes "Southampton Council in the UK has been ordered to stop snooping on every taxi cab in the city. Privacy watchdog, the Information Commissioner's Office has said it is "disproportionate" to demand that every Southampton taxi has CCTV that constantly monitors driver and passengers, including recording all conversations."
Or at least in Sydney, pretty much every cab has recording devices "for the safety of driver and passenger". Most appeared after the well publicised bashing of taxi drivers. Thanks numpties for ruining privacy for the rest of us.
The organisation doing the "telling off" here, the Information Commissioner's Office, is actually surprisingly good at these sorts of cases, on these sorts of scales. I know someone who was being followed by his landlord (by PIs -- looking for any breach of his tenancy agreement), and the ICO prosecuted all involved; a solicitor was disbarred and the landlord might face criminal prosecutions. In this case, the relatively small bit of government -- a city council, the smallest 'unit of democracy' in the UK -- being told off here has no choice but to take the ruling and stop taping everyone's conversation (and/or sexy fun time) in the back of a cab.
Quite why it is that the ICO can tell off Southampton Council for recording people routinely, and yet can do nothing about the fact that everyone's movements across and through London are routinely tracked, however, escapes me. There are more CCTV cameras in london per capita than anywhere else in the world; one need only walk around outside and be followed, tracked and dated whenever you're going anywhere. Automatic CCTV numberplate recognition algorithm will automatically fine you for stopping on a (double) yellow line for more than a minute, or for straying into a bus (or, now, unfortunately, "Games") lane, irrespective of whether or not you had any choice in the matter. I find it depressing that the specific extra-governmental regulatory body designed to stop these sorts of things is so powerless when it comes down to telling off people who actually are important.
My UID is prime. Is yours?
I've helped installed a few of the "Captured by Askari Taxi Security Camera Systems" (used by cabcharge in Queensland in response to the given bashing) a few years ago and the data recorded is nowhere near as bad as the OP suggests.
The system only records infra-red JPEG images (with GPS and timestamp) of the inside and outside doors upon the following conditions:
- The brakes are applied hard
- The door opens
- The meter is payed
- 5 minutes before and 5 minutes after the panic button is pressed (in 5 second intervals)
These might have changed in the last few years but I doubt it.
If the Police (in the UK) Stop a Car driver they can legally ask for a driving licence (and so get identification)
If the Police (in the UK) stop a cyclist or pedestrian, then they have no power of search or to ask for ID, unless they arrest you....which they are loathe to do without evidence ...
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
They can ask until they're blue in the face, but they won't get it. You're not legally obliged to *carry* your identification when you're driving a car, so instead you would get a form (colloquially called 'a producer') which requires you to produce (show) your documents (driving licence, insurance and MOT test) at the police station of your choice within 7 days. Then, because you've not done something which you can be arrested for, you will be allowed on your way.