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Data-Fed Monitoring System Will Put New Yorkers Under Police Surveillance
Nerval's Lobster writes that New York City isn't just gathering data on citizens with cameras and other data sources for sifting through later to seek evidence in the event of violent acts; it's using some of that data in real-time in an attempt to reveal potential criminal activity. They've even picked a name for their system that echoes DARPA's Total Information Awareness, which I guess is more diplomatic than just calling it Precrime:
"The Domain Awareness System will draw data from 911 calls, previous crime reports, license-plate readers, law-enforcement databases, environmental sensors, and roughly 3,000 closed-circuit cameras. It will rely on the New York City Wireless Network (NYCWiN), a high-speed wireless broadband infrastructure that allows city agencies to rapidly transmit data, and used for everything from emergency response to reading meters. Mayor Bloomberg argued that the system isn't an example of Big Brother overstepping the line. 'What you're seeing is what the private sector has used for a long time,' he told Gothamist. 'If you walk around with a cell phone, the cell phone company knows where you are. We're not your mom and pop's police department anymore.'"
How many times have we heard one thing said and the opposite done?
"We're not your mom and pop's police department anymore." That's the problem Mr. Bloomberg.
Mayor Bloomberg argued that the system isn't an example of Big Brother overstepping the line. 'What you're seeing is what the private sector has used for a long time,' he told Gothamist. 'If you walk around with a cell phone, the cell phone company knows where you are. We're not your mom and pop's police department anymore.'"
The difference here is that I am not allowed to opt-out of the government's system. I am able to choose whether I want to allow the private sector to know where I am by not buying a cell phone. Big difference there, chief.
The difference, of course, is that only government holds the special "right" to employ physical force as a business model. Private business can only hurt you with the blessing of government. Government can hurt you at will, and with no recourse.
The more you troll the less people listen to you.
If you walk around with a cell phone, the cell phone company knows where you are
And if I have a bank account, then the bank knows how much money I have or what all my transactions are. That doesn't mean police gets to use that information indiscriminately/without a warrant.
What we need is the human equivalent of license plate "protectors". I foresee a new fashion trend...
Nullius in verba
Remarkably on-topic.
Once everyone has their every waking moment recorded, let's see how many offhand comments, politically-incorrect statements, and slip-of-the-tongue mistakes you make. I bet it'll be more than 28 in four years.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Sea kelp.
That was shown to be hopelessly insecure at this year's DefCon?
http://t.co/hQLAwPg5
I dont get it.. what's microsoft have to do with this??
>> System Will Put New Yorkers Under Police Surveillance
This is a great idea... in Soviet Russia.
That would be the response from my "friends" if I posted this on facebook. They just don't see anything wrong with this level of surveillance (or police ramming-down your door and shooting you).
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
This being North America, just watch, all that data will soon be leased to advertisement firms for even more brainwa.. err.. targeted advertisement.
Just curious?
No. You're our Big Brother's police department.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Soviet Russia's KGB in its wildest wet dreams never imagined the level of Big Brother surveillance that the US government/corporate partnership could put into place here with modern technology. By contrast, the Soviet citizen of 1980 had far more privacy and anonymity.
That I'm right, and you don't like it, doesn't mean I'm a troll.
@Mitreya: the police can and do seize cell location data without warrant, I've seen it happen (in the referred instance it did put a man away for 18-to-life for burning down his parent's house, nearly killing his entire family. When information like that is referred to in a court of Law, warrant or not the jury can't unhear what's been said no matter how adamantly the judge insists on it. That unwarranted seizure is the ONLY thing that put the guy away).
Which is why the cellphone stays HOME. Where I go and what I do is my business. Take it as read that my activities are completely lawful.
I carry a simplex personal mobile radio in case I need to communicate with anyone out of earshot. The people I need to talk to have similar equipment. The only time the thing transmits is when I key that button.
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
Mayor Bloomberg argued that the system isn't an example of Big Brother overstepping the line.
That shouldn't even be up for debate here. If we're taking up that debate with the Mayor, then we've already fallen for his straw-man and are missing the point completely. Of COURSE it's overstepping the line; that's obvious and doesn't need debate. The real problem here is that New Yorkers aren't fighting stuff like this for all they're worth - non-violent whenever possible, violent when necessary. And yes, that's constitutionally protected free speech.
For now, Bloomberg, you evil fiend, I hope this at least destroys whatever tourist traffic is left in the big apple. I, for one, will not ever be traveling to your city as long as this crap exists (and it's a shame, because there is much about New York that I love).
Deja Moo: The distinct feeling that you've heard this bull before.
Great, so we'll be able to use the exact same system to monitor police brutality and illegal acts and be able to swiftly bring the perpetrators to justice. If the police have no problem using the system on us then they can't have a problem with us using it on them... right?
(the TV show, ofc)
Bush mispoke just as many times, and surprise surprise they aren't front page headlines less than a decade later let along for the next century.
Just like week I called someoe "Anna" when their name was actually "Anne" - you would have been amazed.
10 years from now...
Narrator: Much like web pages have a Google Pagerank, we can give people a CrimeRank based on how likely they are to commit a crime based on who there seen near or who they are connected to, along with analysis of behavior patterns. When their crimerank gets to high we just send the drones out to track them and incapacitate them until the authorities arrive. The whole thing can run completely automated and everything will be just fine as long as we never turn it off. If we turn it off, their will be chaos. If the defendent asks why he was arrested we will tell him that the algorithm is secret .... so we can't tell him. If people knew how the algorithm worked then they would find ways around it and we can't have that! Before all this police relied on guesswork and unreliable or intimidated witnesses and inconvienient and difficult to process material evidece to make their case. Thankfully, with CrimeRank, we just push a button, the drones fly out and the crime problem is solved!
Sure there are, at least if you want your vote to count. There are laws that restrict who can be elected to each and every elected public office in the country. Sometimes, the restrictions are things like age, citizenship, and duration of residency in a particular region, but sometimes they are more involved.
Seriously, what happened? Have they always been a mustache-twirling, comically evil organization? Did they make Lex Luthor the police chief on 9/12/2001?
Becoming the Stasi isn't an improvement.
Businesses shouldn't be allowed to collect data that the government can't.
Government shouldn't be allowed to collect data because "the private sector already does this."
I had the misfortune to attend a conference a few weeks ago where salesmen were being taught about "big data" by marketdroids.
These guys were drooling about wholesale intrusion into the most private aspects of our lives.
It really is the rise of big brother. The fact that it is a corporation instead of government is of little practical value; monitoring data gives those who have it power, and that power will always be abused - and will result in ruined or destroyed lives, reduced freedom, and corrupt leadership (whether government or corporate).
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
What, exactly, is a non data-fed monitoring system? What exactly would it monitor if not data?
Just because the private sector is doing wrong things, it doesn't justify the city doing wrong things.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Just another perfect example out of many why I have no desire whatsoever to set foot in New York City.
So many people crammed into an overpriced concrete jungle with no privacy and no rights... sounds like Hell to me.
Only idiots vote for people based on what they say and how many times they misspeak.
The difference between Bush and Obama is that Bush's policies were just as stupid as the crap that spewed from his drawling mouth.
I really hope you get paid for sloshing this tripe all over the intertubes. If not, well that would be a very sad story. On the bright side, I guess it's the result of the Citizens United decision creating jobs. Go SCOTUS!
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
I understand why 'big brother' makes a person who considers themselves free, deeply suspicious. However surely the problem is not the system but the corrupt entities that may attempt to use the system for nefarious purposes.
Whatever your version of what big brother may be, the fact is that the technology required to deliver such a system will happen. We should be discussing the benefits of such a system, and discussing some air tight laws to define how such a system is used and that it cannot ever be corrupted.
Fighting against the inevitable only has one conclusion.
> that echoes DARPA'sTotal Information Awareness,
> which I guess is more diplomatic than just calling it Precrime
And way, way, wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy more diplomatic than calling it Big Brother.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
This is what happens when the greatest city in the world lets a jackal co-opt a third term.
Mayor Bloomberg argued that the system isn't an example of Big Brother overstepping the line. 'What you're seeing is what the private sector has used for a long time,' he told Gothamist. 'If you walk around with a cell phone, the cell phone company knows where you are. We're not your mom and pop's police department anymore.'"
How in the hell is that statement supposed to make me feel comfortable?
Ceci n'est pas un sig.
If the video is not shown, then by law, the cops should not be allowed to testify about what they saw, heard, said, or did. I.e. it should be assumed that the cops destroyed the evidence to allow them to lie.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
"Total Information Awareness" sounds pretty horrible, if *that* is the euphemism.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
... ever become mayor of a city like New York. That's what I wonder.
As far as I recall the big Apple used to be one of the the freest places
a critical thinker could live in. Now it it seems just like a reactionaries'
hub.
And why don't Newyorkers just give this guy Bloomberg the boot.
It's been in use for 6 months already. and the public is just now finding out?
The greatest right given is the right to be wrong...
"...private companies already do it"
The difference Mr Bloomberg is that the private company doesn't claim the right to fine, tax and impound your whole existence for little more than breathing.
Nor does AT&T have the power of arrest and detention.
Standing up and saying its not Big Brother doesn't make it so. The sad part is New Yorkers will probably go for this in a heart beat. All you need to do is whisper World Trade Center, and all opposition voices will be drowned out. Take it from me, my sister lords it over me every time this type of issue comes up because she was 6 blocks away on 9/11.
Have you ever lived/worked in N.Y.C.? You've got some seriously dangerous animals who have no human compassion at all in them. And thanks to video, face recognition and cell tracking these heartless criminals are getting caught more and more. If having to give up some "in public" privacy means my sisters are safer when there, then HELL YES! Take my photo! Recognize my face and track my damn phone! I don't do illegal things, and don't care if I get stop & frisked for weapons. You can't be against public surveillance then complain later when you or your loved ones get mugged/raped/killed. Welcome to the modern life.
Mayor Berzelius Windrip argued that the system isn't an example of Big Brother overstepping the line.
FTFY.
Considering that the words "forty" and "fifty" are very similar, yes, I expect it was a slip of the tongue. Every president (and indeed, every other politician, executive, and other celebrity) has made just as many mistakes. They're human. It happens.
Do you expect the act of inauguration to somehow free a person from all distractions? Or does it magically provide an extra few hours a day to set aside for practicing upcoming speeches? Or is it just this particular person that's under examination, when the last president was just as bad?
It's a simple fact of life that people often mix up thoughts while speaking. It's so common that nobody notices everyday occurrences unless they're particularly egregious. When the speaker is a celebrity, though, suddenly it's a big deal that supposedly reflects negatively on the intelligence of the person. We all know perfectly well what the speaker intended, so why is a misspoken phrase so important?
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
No, as they used to respect the privacy of the honest citizen.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
How does one flip a bit "0.03" times?
Bits are integers (zero and one specifically), not fractions or floating point values. Please revise your equation to count specific known instances. Do not average potential instances, extrapolated from "fuzzy" data.
= Fail!
Mr Bloomberg, I see what you did there!
Are you kidding, there are 6 full volumes of "Bush"isms... and not just half conscious blathering performed at the end of 4, 22 hours days. Obama is well known for brilliantly reading speeches, he's an excellent orator. Even Reagan, a man who could handle a written speech with the best (there is no better training for public speaking than being an actor.) Opened his mouth and delivered unprepared howlers.Face it, The guys that run our country are forced to deal with topics outside their expertise, and if they're hard working SOBs, then in a tired moment stupid stuff will be said. If you have 4 years of public speaking, and in that time they can only hang a couple dozen faux paus on you, while having a body of public speaking that typically excellent. No biggie,
You can't honestly compare that to a man (Dubyah) who couldn't open his mouth prepared or not, and reflexively not have something stupid fall out. That kind of nit picking is the sign of someone whose rectum is much too firmly clenched. Nobody denies that Ronny was "The Communicator", and that his comments about "catchup being a vegetable" or that "trees cause pollution" were aberrations in an otherwise pretty spectacular job of speaking to the masses.
In short, if you wanna burn on Obama for caving in to Hollywood, or gutting our rights as citizen, I got some matches right here, and I can be back with some lighter fluid in about 5 minutes. You wanna make like he's Bush #2 the talking baboon, ah, not so much, in fact your hurting your own cause, because you just look like a childish hater pulling stuff outta your posterior to trump up as an issue... that ain't him looking stupid. Its you.
It's been gradual but i think we can say it's official that The Big Apple has become The Big Fuck You.
You have obscene pricing, crooked cops, they completely ignoring everything bad going down on Wall Street (and their major cocaine habit), they are a nanny city telling you that you cant have a large soda and now they are going Big Brother on everyone (that isn't part of the government).
Corporations really dont give a damn about what people do so long as they keep getting money from them. However, governments are just itching to break out the swat team for a double parked car.
I think it's time to blow the bridges and drag it out to sea with all the vermin on it.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
I will smile, give the thumbs-up, and look the other way because I love my country and I am a patriot.
Hate to tell you this, but those sorts of expressions are not part of the language. They tend to be local. Tell someone in America to call the bobby and he'll be completely baffled. Tell someone in Britain to dial 911, and they'll look at you with equal puzzlement. His mistake was in saying "...what the term is in Austrian" rather than "what the Austrian term is", a much more forgivable misordering of words.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Appropriate, because it's not my mom and pop's country anymore.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
This is unreal and totaly big brother watching us. First Bloomberg wants to limit our soda cup size ( not even joking ) and then he wants to create micro apartments for $1100-$1500 a month. And now he is ok with this whole monitoring system. What kind of society do we live in? we don't need our hands held and our movements watched, we were not born out of a NYC vagina you're not my mother. This is for our safety, please give me a break. It's just the hunger for control and greed by and for the rich.
tonyaldo.com
Big Brother phase 1 (Complete)
These guys were drooling about wholesale intrusion into the most private aspects of our lives.
It really is the rise of big brother. The fact that it is a corporation instead of government is of little practical value; monitoring data gives those who have it power, and that power will always be abused - and will result in ruined or destroyed lives, reduced freedom, and corrupt leadership (whether government or corporate).
You're talking about Google, right?
http://venturebeat.com/2010/07/02/facial-recognition-camouflage/
So, let me summarize it:
1.It is OK to do all this surveillance at municipality level, because, you see, it is already done by the private business.
2.But the fact that is is already done by the private business does not mean that it is legal.
3.But because we justified 1, based on 2, now we have 3, it is LEGAL to do all this surveillance.
Now, my friends, do you see why MATH is so important? If you, dear friend, try to prove any lemma or theorem this way, you will repeat the same year again and again and again........
Google is only one of the players. Amazon is another. Throw in most major retailers, financial institutions, and so on. Next comes the data sharing between the organizations (it's only illegal if you get caught...), and you have a real problem.
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
NYC Big Apple already has a microphone system installed for detecting gun shot locations through triangulation. They also have deployed mobile raised platforms for surveillance by cameras and police personnel. They have mobile police command centers with multiple camera poles. What is so startling by the further progression of a surveillance society that the city has become?
We will soon be reading about police drones beings to record suspects and protests and soon after to target suspects and persons of interest with more than surveillance.
When will the first tear gas canister be dropped by a drone?
When will the first person be shot or tasored by a police drone?
The people are not in control of that city.
This is great for whatever supervisors who haven't been out on the streets ever, but the rest of the NYPD still uses *typewriters* and a mainframe system that's a hack job of Pan Am's flight booking software.
If Big Brother is double plus good, then why does it keep doing this kind of scary shit?!
I'd rather live with the chance of terror being visited upon me, than be terrorized for certain at all times.
If you've got nothing to hide, then you've nothing to fear.
^- That may be true; However, if everyone's afraid of something, then it's fucking wrong!
At least he is consistent
He is both anti-gun and pro Big Brother
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Look, I'm really having a McNealy moment here. Repeat after me: "There is on such thing as privacy anymore". Say it. Memorize it. You can get a big laugh out of all the self-important NYPD Deputy Commissioners drawing executive salaries to look like bigshot spy masters in their "24" Situation Rooms (bottom of page), but the fact is, pervasive surveillance and data mining is with us and will only get more so. The ramifications I leave to the reader for now, but get it through your heads: Privacy is dead! Deal with it one way or another.
It probably wouldn't be all that hard to set up an Arduino-based mount that searches for camera lenses. Then fires a powerful laser at them, burning out the CCD.
If you wanted to get really innovative, you could mount it on a drone. That way, there's no vehicle to track. Just swoop in, *FZZAP!*, then swoop out. And because all the cameras are stationary, and maps are so accurate, you could program the drone to work autonomously.
And so you think that this balances things out? The difference here is that the NYC police can take action against citizens, you can spy on the police all day long and you can't do squat, revenge never works people, diplomacy does, we need to talk and discuss what is going on and arrive at better laws to protect both the police and the people they are trying to police.
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When you get a new job and/or get the money to move, you do it.
I know nothing about how to live on my own, but as far as I can tell, one big problem with waiting to move until after you get a job offer is the cost of traveling to and from each interview.
I did.
stop handing over cell records to any tin-star sheriff if that were legally possible.
How can you quote something and STILL miss it?
I didn't miss it. Telecom companies share personal information with government (including law enforcement) far more easily than is the minimum legally required (that is, if they were going to stop if it was "legally possible", they would be doing less than they do.) They do so because for PR and other reasons (including the fact that in some percentages -- but not all -- of the cases where they currently voluntarily share information without compulsion, they would be ultimately be compelled to share information) it serves the corporations interest in maximizing profits to do so.
I'm not sure what any of that had to do with anything I wrote.
I didn't "burn on Obama", I didn't compare his errors with Bush's. In fact I didn't mention Obama at all. I merely responded to a ludicrous claim with the obvious counter example that what was claimed clearly is not happening.
But sure bring out the insults, calling me stupid will shut me right up I guess.
Surveillance is a 2nd meaning of pseudo democracy/freedom in US.
Recipes for USA bankrupt - http://tinypaste.com/0d66f dd = dollar deluge (printed in the infinity)
This.
Bravo *claps*
I found your post interesting and I agree with most of it. Clinton was also a great speaker, btw, and could make everyone in the room feel like he was talking just to them. He was intelligent and whether it was his doing or not, we enjoyed 8 years of prosperity and sound thinking during his reign.
The difference between Bush and Obama is that Bush's policies were just as stupid as the crap that spewed from his drawling mouth.
I used to think that, too. But I'm starting to think the president doesn't really have that much power anymore. I used to think that the police state started with the Patriot Act but now I think it started somewhat earlier but got a big boost with the Patriot Act. I was hopeful that the current administration would gut it and make bring us back in line with our constitution. But, with all good intentions, it's not happening. I think the power is now held by congress (which is influenced by special interests) and the judicial branch.
"If you've got nothing to hide, then you've nothing to fear."
If I've got nothing to hide, then why are you watching me??
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?