Boston Tech Vs. the Bomber

An anonymous reader writes "Amid rumors of an impending arrest in the Boston Marathon bombing, Xconomy has a rundown of local companies working on technologies relevant to the investigation and aftermath. The approaches include Web analytics to identify communication patterns, image and video analysis of the crime scene, surveillance camera hardware and software, and smart prosthetic devices for amputees. A big challenge the authorities face is the sheer volume and different proprietary formats of video from security cameras, mobile devices, and media groups. Ultimately this will be a case study in whether an individual bent on destruction can remain anonymous in an era of digital surveillance, social media, and crowdsourcing."

Comments

recovery, not prevention.

[hendrikboom]

Well, the emergency response seemed to be on the ball, minimizing the damage. Now we get to see whether the surveillance technologies are up to scratch after the fact.

Prevention is probably impossible.

Re:recovery, not prevention.

[girlintraining]

Prevention is totally possible. Strip all those pesky rights and liberties, problem solved.

It's a little known fact that an investigation of serial murderers has revealed that there isn't a single common motivation amongst them, nor is there a profile. The quintessential serial murderer, Charles Whitman, who climbed a clock tower and sniped dozens below, was at the time cast as the "typical loner". It wasn't released at the time that he had begged his doctors to help him for months beforehand, saying he was developing violent impulses and he didn't know why. He wrote a note just before climbing the tower asking that they do an autopsy after and look at his brain. They did. They found a tumor pressing against a region of the brain responsible for impulse control. The autopsy report at the time (incorrectly) stated that the tumor had no effect on his behavior.

There have been studies done linking lead poisoning to aggression control -- after banning lead in gasoline, the crime rate in every country that did so dropped within a few years by double-digit percentages. I guess what my point here is, is that prevention isn't possible because we don't understand what causes violent behavior. There isn't a single common thread linking them all; There is no profile, and sometimes no violent history. For some reason, perfectly normal people just... break. And it's likely there are many causes. But the takeaway here is that it is not in our nature to be violent to our peers unless threatened. Violent impulses are inherently anti-social, and the human race is a social one. Now, before you argue, note the caveat above: our peers. Our tribe. Our family, etc. Not strangers. In the same way ant colonies will war with each other so do we: But it is not a behavioral norm to attack our peers.

Which is why, in the final analysis, stripping away people's rights and liberties will do exactly dick for prevention. All it will do is lower the quality of life for everyone, while accomplishing a vanishingly small improvement in the safety of the same. We need to understand violence better before we can achieve long-term gains. Imagine if researchers discovered a drug that removes violent impulses. In fact, for schizophrenics, that's more or less exactly what we have today: A common mental condition which, if untreated, leads to violent impulses, but if treated, creates a productive and contributing member of society. Should we lock them up... or give them medical treatment?

Arguments for reductions in our civil rights and freedoms in order to improve safety are fundamentally flawed. The two aren't related -- not statistically, not empirically... there is no association between the two, except in our own worldviews which demand a link be there when one is not. And we do it because we want to feel like we have control. But we don't. We don't even know why... if there even is a why. And that is deeply unsettling to most. That's why people cry out for restrictions... not because they'll do any good, but because they feel a need to do something, anything, to restore their sense of personal power.

Re:recovery, not prevention.

[Anonymous Coward]

You've confused serial killing and mass killing. And yes, there are motivations for both, though the reasoning may not always be clear. The Columbine mass killing certainly had a cause as well as many other mass killings where a man kills his wife and everybody around him. Outside of the cases of domestic violence mass killing, the common profile of the perpetrators is social isolation. For this reason, I have to wonder if many of these mass killings were not caused by a mental illness, but by the consequences of being ostracized and outcast due to having the mental illness. Perhaps it is the stigmatization of mental illness that is causing these problems. If this is true, then attacking the mentally ill after mass killings and using them as scapegoats might be very counterproductive since it will cause more of them to be socially isolated.

Re:recovery, not prevention.

[girlintraining]

You've confused serial killing and mass killing.

No, I have not. Differing definitions do not mean differing underlying psychological conditions. My point was that violence is inherently anti-social. It doesn't matter whether you're anti-social with a lot of dead bodies in a short period of time, or anti-social with a lot of dead bodies over an extended period of time, you've still got a screw loose.

For this reason, I have to wonder if many of these mass killings were not caused by a mental illness, but by the consequences of being ostracized and outcast due to having the mental illness.

Despite reams of scientific studies and a great many books on criminology indicating that being ostracized and outcast is a stereotype, not a fact. You're drawing on a common prejudice that has no empirical basis.

Re:recovery, not prevention.

[girlintraining]

Shooting lots of people seems a very specific reaction to a loss if impulse control. Why didn't he lose bladder control, or some such more obvious reaction to loss of control.

Perhaps because the centers of the brain responsible for bladder control aren't the same parts that handle aggression... otherwise our action movies would consist of burly men gunning down their enemies while wearing Depends.

The Charles Whitman article states he was predisposed to violence and popped pills.

He passed Marine basic training and a full psychological workup. They didn't find anything. He applied to study mechanical and architectural engineering as part of his efforts to become a commissioned officer. Although his college career sputtered, he maintained his reputation as an outstanding Marine, and in one case single-handedly lifted up an overturned Jeep to free fellow soldiers in an accident. There's no history of a predisposition for violence cited in any available professional medical assessments for him. The pills they found on him after he was shot were part of a survival kit that he had assembled beforehand, no doubt part of his military training. He had no history of drug abuse, and the drugs given at the time were available within the military at the time (but not today) as stimulants for long-term deployments.

The article that you read, undoubtedly is sensationalist garbage, an attempt to try to explain irrational impulses. Because if it can be explained, then he can be blamed. We certainly don't want a mass murderer to appear as though his violence was the result of an uncontrollable medical condition -- because that would mean that the violence wasn't preventable. It would mean we were powerless against it. It would mean, most critically for the average person, that a higher moral authority didn't exist and didn't prevent it from happening -- that the universe doesn't reward good behavior and punish bad behavior, but that it doesn't care. That sometimes, bad things just happen. Whatever article you read, is based on emotive reasoning.

In actuality, this was a perfectly normal man who, likely as a result of an emergent medical condition, lost his impulse control through no fault of his own, became violent, and killed a bunch of people before being killed himself. That doesn't at all fit with our need for vengance -- though people usually call it 'justice' instead. But it isn't. The need for vengance is a major motivation for our justice system, just not one anyone wants to discuss because it's taboo.

Re:recovery, not prevention.

[xelah]

My point was that violence is inherently anti-social.

Hmm, is it really? Some violence perhaps, like the mass/serial killer examples (though if one serial killer is copying his hero, is that social behaviour or not?). But take, say, Northern Irish terrorism, or perhaps extreme religious terrorism, too. Or gang violence. Couldn't that be caused in part by inherently social processes? By people wanting to belong to the group, to be admired by the group, or a group talking each other in to more and more extreme and 'pure' views? The most extreme example - war - is a very social activity indeed. Being anti-violence in a war can itself be seen as anti-social by others.

I wouldn't want to say that (especially) bizarre behaviour motivated by extreme religious views or behaviour isn't a mental health issue as well, though, one that sometimes turns in to a criminal issue. But it isn't easy to draw the line (Jonestown? Al Qaeda in 2001? The crusades? Terrorist groups responding to relatives killed by US drones? The Westboro nutters?).

Not in the article

[girlintraining]

Not in the article: Success rates and false positives.

The problem with these type of technologies is that even if they're 99% effective, that still means they're useless. You need to be about 99.9% effective before the false positive rate drops to a point where it is investigationally useful. If these technologies happen to finger the person who did this, everyone will point to it as proof that it works. But I can tell you right now, there won't be any news stories of the dozens to hundreds detained, questioned, and humiliated by simply matching an arbitrary profile -- because in both the media's eyes and the general public, that would be flinging mud on a "hero".

I'm all for investigation into these technologies... but none of them are mature enough yet to be used in criminal investigations responsibly.

One can always remain anon if he tries hard enough

[Anonymous Coward]

If a person is reasonable intelligent, and a loner, I have no doubt that covering tracks would be possible if one really wanted to.

Don't talk on social media.
Don't tell anyone.
Buy supplies with cash in different locations, spread over significant time.
Wear different clothing/hat/sunglasses and don't ever use them before of after the event.
Die your hair, shave, obscure your style and gender.
Don't drive a car, anywhere.
Don't do obvious stuff like use cellphones in the operation.

Fortunately, the type of people capable of this kind of stuff tend not to be the brightest bulbs.

Re:The Mechanical Turk may be faster...

[Anonymous Coward]

Translation: 4chan accused everybody with a black backpack of being the bomber. Especially if they were caught looking at a girl's ass instead of the shitty view of the marathon.

And none of them match the FBI's person of interest description.

Re:The Mechanical Turk may be faster...

[girlintraining]

4chan may have found them... http://imgur.com/a/sUrnA

They also found Natalie Portman, naked and petrified, thousands of times. 4Chan is not exactly a bastion of reliable information. Now I get what you're saying about crowdsourcing, but there's another, older term, for this sort of thing:

Witch hunt.