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New Privacy Threat: Automated Vehicle Occupancy Detection
An anonymous reader writes: The Electronic Frontier Foundation is warning against a new potential privacy threat: cameras that look inside cars and try to identify how many people are inside. This technology is a natural combination of simpler ones that have existed for years: basic object recognition software and road-side cameras (red light cameras, speeding cameras, license plate readers — you name it). Of course, we can extrapolate just a bit further, and point out that as soon as the cameras have high enough resolution, they can start running face recognition algorithms on the images, and determine the identities of a vehicle's occupants.
"The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG), a government umbrella group that develops transportation and public safety initiatives across the San Diego County region, estimates that 15% of drivers in High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes aren't supposed to be there. After coming up short with earlier experimental projects, the agency is now testing a brand new technology to crack down on carpool-lane scofflaws on the I-15 freeway. ... In short: the technology is looking at your image, the image of the people you're with, your location, and your license plate. (SANDAG told CBS the systems will not be storing license plate data during the trial phase and the system will, at least for now, automatically redact images of drivers and passengers. Xerox's software, however, allows police the option of using a weaker form of redaction that can be reversed on request.)"
"The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG), a government umbrella group that develops transportation and public safety initiatives across the San Diego County region, estimates that 15% of drivers in High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes aren't supposed to be there. After coming up short with earlier experimental projects, the agency is now testing a brand new technology to crack down on carpool-lane scofflaws on the I-15 freeway. ... In short: the technology is looking at your image, the image of the people you're with, your location, and your license plate. (SANDAG told CBS the systems will not be storing license plate data during the trial phase and the system will, at least for now, automatically redact images of drivers and passengers. Xerox's software, however, allows police the option of using a weaker form of redaction that can be reversed on request.)"
Beyond the privacy problem, a key issue here is the problem of false positives. The system claims a 96% accuracy in detecting people in passenger seats, which is a huge error rate for sending people fines. A policeman can actually stop you and look in the car, which they have to do before writing a ticket.
The problem is that such fines are expensive to contest (you have to take time off work, show up to court etc). Many people will just pay. This is not a criminal prosecution situation where "presumption of innocence" in the legal sense is relevant, but the principle applies here too: you should hold the government to a high standard of proof here.
So let me get this straight rich gits with chauffeurs get priority over everyone else because why, why the fuck, why? So do you or do you not count a professional driver in the car with one, just one fucking person actually travelling to a destination. That other person is just a labour saving device and not a person going to a destination, yet the rich git in the back gets priority over the nobodies who can not afford a limousine with an associated driver. Should a taxi with one passenger be in the HOV lane or not, reality is no but in order to favour limousine passenger, oh yeah.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
"SANDAG says the current test system is not storing license plate numbers" Well DUH, that's what the NSA's giant datacenter in Utah is for! SANDAG / Xerox may not be storing this, but no one said they aren't just passing along all this data to someone who will. And the FBI claimed Stingray never existed either...
So let me get this straight rich gits with chauffeurs get priority over everyone else because why, why the fuck, why?
Because "people being chauffeured around" represent such a small proportion of rush-hour traffic that basing a decision around this particular concern would be far more emotional than pragmatic.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
There's money involved but the enforcement of laws is more important. No enforcement = no compliance. Yes this can be used for bad, but so can every single technology ever made. It's all about how it is used.
At first glance, all of these technologies are implemented solely for the purpose for bring in more money to the government.
HOV lanes exist to encourage ride sharing and to reduce the traffic load during rush hour.
Ticketing cheaters serves that end and is not exclusively about monetary gain for the State
So yes, you are being cynical, though I wouldn't take off the tin foil hat.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
HOV lanes exist to encourage ride sharing and to reduce the traffic load during rush hour.
Yeah, that's what it says on the tin. In reality they just eat up a lane of traffic that could otherwise be used to alleviate rush hour congestion. It might be different if they actually ADDED HOV lanes instead of taking one of the normal lanes and rebranding it. After all, who's going to get into a car with a bunch of strangers, and not have a vehicle when they reach their destination?
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
And when has a government used increased power over it's citizens for good? Any government in history will do.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
No enforcement = no compliance.
"The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) ... estimates that 15% of drivers in High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes aren't supposed to be there."
Apparently there's 85% compliance even without this particular means of enforcement. Is possibly gaining another 15% worth the cost? (Where "cost" includes money, privacy, increased government, etc.)