Slashdot Mirror
In Australian Town, Public CCTV Off Over Privacy Concerns
freddienumber13 writes "The CCTV cameras operated by the local government in the country town of Nowra, NSW (Australia) have been turned off following an order by the Administrative Decisions Tribunal. The local government is crying because it believes that it is losing an effective method in combating crime in public. Locals however are rejoicing that they are no longer being recorded whilst walking down the street."
I welcome any and all pushback against monitoring of the public.
Here is related news, not quite the same implications, but a good trend none the less:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/02/22/states-local-governments-join-push-to-turn-off-red-light-cameras/
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
...or just "turned off"?
This is a victory for the people. I worked for a CCTV company for over a year and a half. Every move you made and conversation you had was recorded and the management did go back and listen and watch. If you didn't give 110% and say anything that could be remotely offensive to the management, you got called into the office and dealt with. A perfect picture of where we are heading as a nation and as a planet. I will say it again, the CCTV cameras getting turned off is a victory for the people and personal privacy.
After allegations made by a member of the public, only identified as SF, that the council had used its CCTV cameras to obtain personal information from him, the council was ordered to refrain from any conduct or action in contravention of the act.
The tribunal also ordered the council to render a written apology to SF for the breaches and advise him of any steps to be taken by council to remove the possibility of similar breaches in the future. The cameras are to remain turned off until the decision of the tribunal has been considered."
I wonder what personal info was gathered about the guy, and how.
Cameras don't combat crime. They don't prevent crime, they don't deter criminals, they don't allow police to stop perpetrators.
They are evidence after the fact, and a really easy way for the government to spy on you.
The cops sure hate it when they are prevented from thuggery by inane laws.
Don't be fooled or led to believe otherwise.
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
The local government is crying because it believes that it is losing an effective method in combating crime in public. Locals however are rejoicing that they are no longer being recorded whilst walking down the street."
WHO runs the "local" government here? Apparently *not* the locals, if "their" local government feels differently than them. Time to hire a different police chief? Time to ELECT a different "local" government?
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
If I or my neighbor can walk down the street with a camcorder or place one on my property looking out on the street I see no problem the police also doing so. Public is public. If it is effective I see no reason police can't put cameras up everywhere they could patrol. Furthermore the cameras don't need to be visible or obvious. I would personally place them outside bars and in high crime areas.
What I do object to is that the police are not required to be discrete about information they acquire. They and their employers need to be held accountable for disservice to the public. In other words they should not be able to blackmail or otherwise manipulate people. For example if someone commits adultery they should need a court order/oversight to reveal that information to anyone.
It's like the old days of switchboard operators in small towns that listened on on other peoples business. The police are in a position and have the opportunity to witness very private moments. Like for example a teenage girl in an auto accident resulting in a mutilated face. As private citizens they can do what they want but as police on the job they should be accountable to be discrete.
Technology is only going to make it easier and easier for governments and corporations to spy on us to an ever higher degree. There will always be those governments who are "doing it for our own good" and corporations that just do it for money. So I don't think that we should have to fight our governments and corporations every time that a new idea or abuse of technology pops into their heads. We don't just need laws but an actual constitutional amendment enshrining our Right to privacy. The 4th amendment is pretty good and often interpreted but I think that governments should be extremely limited in their data gathering ability. I don't want license plate readers noting where I am, and I really don't want video recognition systems starting to note where I am and who I'm with. I don't want visa selling information about what I buy.
There is certain information that certain parts of government genuinely need. Say driver's license information. But I think that it should be a jailable offense for any other government or non government person to access that information for any reason outside of checking if I am legally allowed to drive or not. If my power company has my billing information and address then they should only be allowed to access the information for the purpose of billing me or turning my power on. Even if their own marketing department wants a list of customers to send "educational information" they should not have access to that information. Certainly the government or a corporation should not be ever able to sell my information to "trusted third parties." Not only do I not trust those third parties but I Hate them.
One tiny trick I do is to use slight variations of my address with different organizations that I have to deal with Suite 30, Apt 33b, Unit 30 Upper to see who sells my information. Basically they all do. With extended information gathering do you think they won't sell that information.
I am in the grocery store and they are watching me (as in their facial recognition knows its me) and they see me look at Crapios a new cereal that is 110% Sugar. I examine the box to laugh at how crappy it is. Then I get a text with a coupon for crapios, I get home and there are flyers for crapios, And Visa makes a note that I am less credit worthy because people who eat crapios are generally stupid. On my drive home I get 3 speeding tickets and 4 stop sign tickets because the drones and nearly infinite traffic cameras get you each time you go 1mile over the speed limit or don't come to an absolute halt at a stop sign. Having lost my driver's license I decide to leave this stupid country for one with personal privacy protection and print my boarding pass and see another ad for crapios. Then I log into the internet and get no ads for crapios because I have ad-blocking software.
Nothing in the linked article supports the claim about "locals rejoicing". Maybe most people there are happy about the decision, maybe they're disappointed, maybe they don't care. The claim made about them in the Slashdot summary appears to be unsupported.
That's cute, it really is.
What I think you mean (not that it will ever make a difference) is that you resent the that fact law enforcement will record everything that you ever do, in hopes that it will inevitably be used against you (and it will), while anything and everything that you ever record will inherently be tossed out of court on account of the fact that public recordings of government and/or law enforcement officials is an inherently unlawful act.
Welcome to the United States, we hope that you enjoy your convicted and thoroughly enforced time here ;)
I was born and raised in nowra and over the years it's got worse ..... They need to have more CCTV cameras so people can feel safe .... Nowra is worse then most parts of Sydney ,clean it up and reconnect them and add more ... All you people that are against it , would be a different story when something happens to you or your family you will change your mind ... Wake up nowra and clean up the streets .
After the government's recent acknowledgment that their facial recognition cameras didn't work in Boston (weren't they upgraded a couple of years ago after that video game advertisement prank) and with all the cost cutting going on in Washington how could the government afford to hire enough workers (even at minimum wage) to watch all the cameras. And we certainly don't want to contract this out to private industry - businessmen would need to hire illegals to make their "1%" level of profit. We could require seniors to watch cctv footage to offset social security payments. An "American Watch" type public service program.
this is the new trend.
the police state is coming to an end.
Maybe there are issues of future concern here. New technologies always involve thoughtful consideration of how they change the world, they do need to be considered and not ignored out of hand.
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
I didn't know until I was chatting to the estate super, he said it was cheaper than hiring gate security guards, and had been used to locate a car that was used in a murder (eventually capturing the owner). Cameras can sometimes be useful in catching someone *afterwards*.
The thing is, now I know the cameras are there, it creeps me out. I don't like being watched all the time. It doesn't give me a sense of security, it gives me a sense that creepy control freaks now rule my life. I get letters from the estate management, about driving slower on the entry road, about not swerving around the speed bumps on my bike, about turning my bin right way up, only if its not empty, and so on. Before I use to think these were generic letters sent to everyone, but no, they're individually sent after individually being monitored with the camera!
I'm sure they would have caught the murder a different way (his car plate would have been spotted it was only a matter of time), but the loss of privacy really does make a hell of a difference to the quality of life. I'd be happy if the cameras only pointed to everyone else but me, and I think that's the point. It's fine as long as your not the one being watched with them.
It's not that I trust our government, but I do know that they're not a totalitarian regime.
Of course they aren't a totalitarian regime because if they were, they would not need your approval. Ask your yourself this: Lets say that all governments wish to be a totalitarian regime, but they have a problem in that they are operating under a democracy and need gain your approval.
Why do their ideas always result in increase surveillance when there are always 763 options at their disposal to reduce crime?
If you go along with ever idea they want to do, you won't long be claiming they aren't a totalitarian regime --- but if they get everything they want, your opinion also will no longer matter either.
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
This story has video of one of the U.S.'s police beating a teenage girl up, and the page has links to others, so cameras will sometimes protect citizens, albeit after the fact. http://jonathanturley.org/2009/09/29/seattle-officer-fired-over-videotaped-beating-of-teenage-girl-in-cell/
This is Australia. It is like turning off the cameras in a prison.
The Official Site of 1337 Pwnage
Are there CCTV cameras in City Hall so the public can make sure there are no crimes happening with their money?
Mostly random stuff.
Statistically a fair bulk of violent crime occurs on Friday and Saturday after the hours of 11 PM due to the work week, off days and when alcohol consumptions occurs. For a moment, let's say that alcohol consumption and crime have a very positive correlation (and all of this is statistically known, let's say you trust me).
So why extra cameras and not extra police efforts during the known hours of incident based on probabilities due to statistical occurrence?
Or perhaps politicians realize that results and public acclimation don't have a positive correlation (i.e. doing a good job does not mean anyone notices so why do that?) but that furthering the cause of government supervision is always rewarded via the elite (the class with money, the class with the ability to provide funding).
In such a system (and let us for a moment say that this is our system), what is the political motivation for a politician to take the high road?
But that doesn't involve you --- you do get to help pick the road, because politicians need your approval and you are empowered to weigh that yourself and make your own decision. And -- at least today --- you can even make your decision based on illogical or irrational reasons, because that is your right. But what if it weren't your right?
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
I saw Mad Max, Mad Max II and I've played the entire Carmageddon series. So this is easily validated and the traffic citational records confirm thke social trends, based on automobile, highway statics.
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
Is it? I hear the claimed Boston bombers couldn't be identified from all CCTV footage they had of them. And both guys were in the database.
And of course the cameras did nothing to prevent the deed from getting done.
In reality the cameras are there for Total Information Awareness.
http://statismwatch.ca/2009/06/03/uk-schoolkids-protest-cctv-hidden-microphones-in-class/
CCTV in schools with mics.
Code of conduct introduced in 2008 'stops' *councils* (it does not apply to others) using CCTV's with microphones in town centers, after several were caught trying them out. Currently they have *speakers*, the officer will shout at you from the CCTV tower. "Don't cross on the red light", "pick that trash up", "don't park there", "don't pee in that bush"....
It's a real creepy place, the UK, and we voted in Cameron to fix it, but the police fight any changes.
Oh here we go again. Ok Luke. Would you mind if the council installed web cams in all your rooms in your house including toilet bathroom and bedroom? You've nothing to hide right, and we don't want crims to take advantage of those blind spots? Don't worry. You will be monitored by public servants who answer to no one. Yes, Luke, give up all your civil liberties and trust us because it's not as if a government has ever taken advantage of its power over sheep like yourself.
What's the best (most effective, easiest, cheapest) way to destroy/disable one or many CCTV cameras without being caught?
Using a drone to spay black paint on the lens?
I know people aren't going to see this, and it'll never be modded up, but whatever.
I live in a country that has a high number of CCTV cameras (actually, mostly traffic cameras and webcams and security cameras that the police are allowed to access). I feel they are nothing but good.
Every day the news is full of crimes being shown on camera, and the criminals apprehended. While there isn't a lot of serious violent crime, there is plenty of petty theft and the like here, and the cameras help a lot in catching the perpetrators.
Do I worry about being spied on? No, why would I? The cameras are only in public places, somewhere anyone could film me without my knowledge anyway. I live in a fairly large city, why would anyone be interested in me specifically unless I commit a crime? Even if they were, what could they really find out about me by watching some cameras? The places I visit? That I pick my nose and scratch my balls while walking down the street? All of this is obtainable in other ways.
People, it's PUBLIC. You should have no expectation of privacy in public. The government isn't installing cameras in your shower. They aren't bugging your house. They are putting up cameras to record crimes and help catch criminals. All in public areas where you don't have any privacy anyway.
a single person complained and took the action. Not a popular decision.
There was an unknown error in the submission.
I think that attitude works as long as feel the cameras are watched by people who agree with you.
To people wanting to protest a new power station, or protesting banker bailouts, complaining about a bailout, suddenly they're out of the mainstream and the cameras are used to monitor and arrest them.
The police killed a man at the bank protests, Ian Tomlinson, and the cameras miraculously didn't record any of the details. Do you believe the cameras would prevent crime? Did you believe the cameras would be watched dispassionately by upstanding professionals?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Ian_Tomlinson
"Nick Hardwick, chair of the IPCC, said on 9 April there were no CCTV images of the assault on Tomlinson because there were no CCTV cameras in the area.[87] On 14 April, the Evening Standard wrote that it had discovered at least six CCTV cameras in the area around the assault. After photographs of the cameras were published, the IPCC reversed its position and said its investigators were looking at footage recovered from cameras in Threadneedle Street near the corner of Royal Exchange Passage, where Tomlinson was assaulted.[88]"
IPCC = Police complaints authority, police investigating policemen.
It is my right, I know this. I vote accordingly but I don't tend to jump on the old conspiracy theory bandwagon. Critical thinking would suggest Occam's Razor in this case and that the government really wants to just use them for observation which is bad in and of itself in my opinion. Also your question concerning extra police presence, why would you assume it is either/or and not both?
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I'd have thought that if any town could benefit from CCTV it's Nowra!
I'd have thought that if any town needed CCTV it'd be Nowra!
They're just people, there's nothing special about a policeman that makes his judgement somehow so special that its always OK for police to put up cameras and not ok for anyone else.
You wouldn't allow creepy-bob, to install cameras all around a town for his use, yet PC Bob can? But creepy bob can walk around with a camera, so how is it any different if he simply installs cameras everywhere? If the justification is crime prevention and the stats don't show it works as a crime prevention, then PC Bob can't justify it. How is he then any different than creepy bob then?
Would you allow PC Bob to monitor you for dissent with government policy? No? But yet you want to give them carte blanche to install cameras for *any* reason in *any* place they can walk.
Creepy bob and PC bob can walk around with microphones recording everyones conversations. Does that mean they can install microphones everywhere?
Creepy bob and PC bob can walk around with IR cameras, does that mean they can put IR cameras everywhere and show a live youtube feed of inside your home? The court said no, they need a warrant to use the IR cameras that see through walls.
Plus in the real world, creepy bob *is* often PC Bob. They're just people, often a the extremes of society, sometimes a bit creepy. But with a real danger, the power to apply laws.
We have a phrase, 'power crazed' for a reason.
This is why the police could 'kettle' (detain by force) protestors, monitor them with cameras, and arrest those who urinated in public (the police drove them into a square without toilets and wouldn't let people leave, they constructed the crime there). Yet the same police, who had cameras everywhere didn't record a single incident of the police attacking protestors, or the Ian Tomlinson killing (by police).
Even in public you have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Maybe not 100%, but reasonable. It shouldn't be OK to record your every word, your every movement, your every interaction with others. You are *not* a criminal, you are *not* committing a crime.
We are unlikely to do such a stupid thing.
I have first hand experience of seeing criminals caught because of CCTV and I have actually been the responder to an injury spotted by cameras,
At the hospital where I work, car theft and vandalism has almost disappeared since cameras were introduced in the car parks. I have also heard drunks warn each other to behave because there were cameras in A&E. I have also seen where someone was given a watertight alibi where they had been accused of a major crime. Yes, they also catch criminals. That does not worry me either.
I don't know if they have much effect on gun crime. This is the UK and we don't have your problems with that. The last time I heard gunfire not on TV, I was in army uniform and carrying one myself.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
It ends up with a muddled mission statement that government prioritizes its own interests above the what the government is in place to do. i.e. The objective of the government is to further the welfare of the people and this gets lost if a government operates without supervision.
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
Your post is an eloquent and coherent explanation of the risks, that I also recoil from.
I think that the naysayers of today, such as @Rangelus, lack vision. But more importantly, they seem to lack basic knowledge of history. The history of the last 50-100 years alone is rife with incidents that clearly prove all of your points are valid concerns.
I have no issue with near total CCTV coverage in public places, such as we approach today. Provided it remains in disparate "islands" under private control. I am vehemently opposed to it being under central control or general access of the government or any major corporation(s). It is the aggregate access and/or control that is the major risk, not the shop keeper watching his own property.
The naysayers, saying things like what could possibly be wrong with the "security" of blanket CCTV, are always proven wrong in the end. But, usually, by then it is too late to turn back.
There's a difference between being observed and being recorded. Given:
What is the minimum amount of work and paperwork required by Alice before Dave can say (without perjury) on the stand, "We put Carol under surveillance", and Bob can say, "I can't fire her, she did her job exactly as I put to her"?
You'll note that I didn't specify the kind or depth of surveillance. This is deliberate and not an attempt to be vague. I believe you'll figure out for yourself that the bar for Constable Alice can be very very low, and folk more imaginative than you or I could make it lower. Alice, having an actual incentive, might make it much lower than that. This might be the most important legal question society can discuss at the moment; being in a public place and able to be seen by the police doesn't mean you should be recorded by the police. Oddly, applying the same question and reasoning to "Automatic Number Plate Recognition" devices makes them look exceptionally intrusive. Oh, wait...
If opportunity came disguised as temptation, one knock would be enough.
3^2 * 67^1 * 977^1
It seems likely that the only controlling attempt they seem to be going for is that it may result in a lower crime rate because people may act differently if they know they're being watched and/or recorded. Which you could easily say is controlling though I am under the impression you mean on a grander scale than that.
I can appreciate where you're coming from. I can even see where your views are logical conclusions as to what it might be. However, without anything more substantial to go on I don't arrive at that conclusion. There just doesn't seem to be a grand scheme of things like that taking place even in countries such as the UK where the use of CCTV by the government is quite common.
To me it seems that the goal is as stated, it is to monitor and to retroactively help solve crimes. Inasmuch as it changes behaviors I think that's a side effect and not the goal. I believe there are studies that indicate that we change our behavior if we know we're being monitored.
Do governments want to control us? Well, sure. They want us to be law abiding and productive citizens. Other than some notable exceptions I don't see them really trying to control us to the point where they're running roughshod over our rights to the point where we truly have none or that there is a cabal of politicians who are attempting to put us into a state where they are extracting our wealth and labor or anything. It just seems unlikely for that to be the case in all but a small number of countries.
Could it be? Absolutely. I can't even fault someone for thinking that it is like that. I can see that as being a logical conclusion that one could come to. I can see a reasoned approach that would result in thinking that. It may seem naive to you but it seems that my beliefs are more likely to me. I do hope you're not correct.
I really do hope that you're not correct. I do hope that openness in government, free press, and free speech prevent that.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I sometimes feel that the cost of "freedom" seems affordable because it is paid by other people. It's other peoples kids that get killed in a war, it's sad, but it doesn't affect you directly and intimately. But I wonder how someone would feel if their daughter was raped and killed in a place where one of those cameras was taken down. Yes yes, it would probably have happened anyway, but if there was even a 5% chance that it wouldn't happen, how would you feel about that? Is there really any expectation of privacy on a public street? If someone walks by you, should they turn away so that they can't see what you are doing?
Mean what you say...say what you mean.