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Dallas Police Falsely Credit TrapWire System For Arrests

Posted by timothy on from the for-large-values-of-zero dept.

In April, the Texas Department of Public Safety told a reporter for the Dallas Morning News, inspired by information leaked by Wikileaks to ask about ways that the agency might be compromising citizen's privacy and other rights, that the TrapWire behavioral analysis system employed in combination with surveillance equipment posted at various high-profile locations around the state had resulted in 44 arrests. However, after numerous public records requests for more information about those claimed arrests, the agency admitted that the true figure is somewhat lower: namely, zero. The story naturally involves "millions" of dollars (though an exact figure for the zero-arrest system isn't named), and Austin-based Stratfor, a company that's been named a few times here on Slashdot.

31 comments

  1. Even if it was true, terrible value for money by Dr_Barnowl · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Even if it was true... millions of dollars for ... 44 arrests?

    Wonder what the arrest rate of 20 extra pairs of feet on the street is?

    1. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by rmdingler · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Even if it was true... millions of dollars for ... 44 arrests?

      Wonder what the arrest rate of 20 extra pairs of feet on the street is?

      Yep, everything's bigger in Texas: the State Police and the police state.

      Even if it was true... millions of breaches into the innocent communications of private citizens for... 44 arrests.

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    2. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by Dunbal · · Score: 2

      Considering that the Brits are now in the dozens of millions of pounds for standing two (2) policemen outside the Ecuadorian embassy for a couple years, I'd think hundreds of millions of dollars. What this really means is that the system is completely broken and money just disappears, which is to be expected in a corrupt nation.

      --
      Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
    3. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Even if it was true... millions of dollars for ... 44 arrests?

      Wonder what the arrest rate of 20 extra pairs of feet on the street is?

      I can tell you haven't read the article, it's supposed to be some service to detect people casing a location.

      You all can debate the value of THAT, but I'd expect this system to generate zero arrests, and feed into other intelligence tools.

      What's the point of posting if you don't know what you're talking about? I suppose if "surveillance detection" lead to ten thousand arrests a year you would have been OK with that and finished your powdered doughnuts instead of jumping in here?

    4. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Even if it was true... millions of dollars for ... 44 arrests?

      Wonder what the arrest rate of 20 extra pairs of feet on the street is?

      You really want 20 extra pairs of feet on the street considering how honest the current leadership seems to be?

    5. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by akpoff · · Score: 3, Insightful

      None of the stories I've seen put the figure at "dozens of millions of pounds". This article from The Telegraph puts the figure at £11.1 million. The article notes that £6.5m of that figure are "police officer pay costs that would be incurred in normal duties" and mentions overtime costs and "indirect" costs, tallying together to an additional £3.8m. Also, if the picture in the article shows a typical guard detail we see at least 4 uniformed officers, not 2.

      We should also take into account those 4 officers are not engaged in regular beat policing but the very specific task of waiting for a very specific person to exit a specific location. There's also the very real possibility this is a politically-motivated policing detail with all the visibility and CYA costs that come with it.

      The point may yet be valid but to a lesser degree and perhaps not at all just based on numbers. And with the other factors the Assange case may be so unusual that no meaningful comparison can be made.

    6. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by I4ko · · Score: 1

      Well, where I live policeman go on their duties in the squad cars alone due to funding restrictions. Which means that when they are needed, they would not act until another officer arrives, which means that they would not interfere in a situation fast enough, or if they do, put their lives on the line unnecessary. I live in a good, boring, Christian and predominantly white neighborhood. God forbid I actually need police - e.g. if the drunkards who drag race every now and then hit something - police are all busy in the more shady areas of town and will take them 15 minutes to come here. No, the solution is not arming ourselves and making a pitchfork army. In the social contract the police keep the citizens safe. My grandfather was a policeman (in another continent and country), so I may be a little biased, but policeman a people, feed families, care for their children and are generally pretty nice. We should put in place tools to aid them, not to replace them (as with any other professions). We don't want pork for the rich guys, we want jobs for regular people. So yeah, 20 more pairs of feet on the street are 60-80 people having something to eat, a roof over their heads, 20-40 more kids who will be raised in loving families and become good citizens instead of potential criminals. So yeah, 20 extra pair of feet on the street is a no brainer.

    7. Re:Even if it was true, terrible value for money by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If only that were true.... Texas has some of the most criminal friendly laws in the United States dating back to the reconstruction. We have a very strict exclusionary rule, interrogations must be recorded with miranda or they are worthless, local prosecutors get the final right to deny prosecutions and they decline most. Cops are low paid and not motivated to actually work. Records management systems are horrible. The radios are poorly designed and implemented due to federalism and capitalism. This is a great place to commit a crime like arson, insurance fraud, tax fraud, misapplication of funds, etc. Your chances of getting caught are slightly above nil. Even if caught, the prosecutor will be scared of a case like that because it isn't dope, sex assualt, intoxicated offenses or traffic related. In contrast, a federal agent's "recollection of a conversation" is admissible, they have inevitable discovery, exceptions to miranda, etc. But as usual on Slashdot, we can't let the truth get in the way of the cop hating.

    8. Re: Even if it was true, terrible value for money by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      20 extra cops = at least 4 dead afro-americans

  2. Data collection for other purposes? by Mostly+a+lurker · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Apart from the obvious stench of corrupt commercial dealings, we should not forget that data collection by law enforcement has not always been for crime fighting purposes. Recall, for instance, J Edgar Hoover's uses for such data.

    1. Re:Data collection for other purposes? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hoover would have had a ball with the current Hoovering up of data! He would have been so excited, he would have purchased a new dress!

  3. DPS != Dallas Police by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    DPS is the state law enforcement agency. Dallas Police is the police force for the City of Dallas. Maybe that's not an important distinction, but I think basic facts are important for the credibility of a story.

    1. Re:DPS != Dallas Police by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That is an important distinction and the summary clearly states the correct agency. The editors haven't cared for over ten years,

  4. Pork, pork, lovely pork by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    How about doing the policing job first, instead of focusing on the toys and lying about them so you can keep playing and pretending you're doing a decent job of your actual job?

  5. And still... by MitchDev · · Score: 3

    The police wonder why fewer and fewer people trust them at all...

    1. Re:And still... by ememisya · · Score: 4, Interesting

      There's an old Turkish saying, I'll be that guy and translate it. "A barking dog won't bite." It basically means that anyone who is serious about a crime (terror category or the normal category, not sure how it falls into which one, but I suspect one has more beards) is not going to advertise it online or otherwise. Take a look at 9/11, there weren't a lot of tweets about it before hand. Yes indeed sacrificing your privacy only buys paranoia on a large scale, bloated budgets, broken citizens, and smug authorities.

    2. Re:And still... by TonyJohn · · Score: 3, Informative

      Not negating your point, but Twitter was five years too late for 9/11.

      --
      Owl tried to think of something wise to say, but couldn't.
    3. Re:And still... by mr_mischief · · Score: 1

      As do the Slashdot editors, who can't even be assed to double-check that the city of Dallas and the State of Texas might have separate police forces.

    4. Re:And still... by MitchDev · · Score: 1

      It's still law enforcement, regardless of the exact jurisdiction...

  6. Puffery? LOL by Runaway1956 · · Score: 2

    "DPS puffs up its stats the way Donald Trump puffs his hair."

    Face it, cops are cops. They get off on the adrenaline rush when the make a bust, and then they get off on bragging about it afterwards. And, of course the bragging gets inflated.

    Except, in this case, they never even made a bust!

    --
    "Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
  7. so's yer grammer by quonsar · · Score: 1

    Still trying to parse that first paragraph, er sentence.

    --

    Sacred cows make the best burgers.

  8. Everybody runs by rmdingler · · Score: 2

    The Trapwire info page reads like a Hollywood advertisement for the Precrime unit in Minority Report.

    --
    Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

    Ernest Hemingway

    1. Re:Everybody runs by mlts · · Score: 1

      I am not sure from reading the page what exactly Trapwire does. Does it sit, grab facial recognition data, and try to put two and two together if it notices a person at certain places at certain times, then sound an alert to the local security that "so and so is a risk" because they were first at Spatula City, then the Duct Tape Shoppe, now they are showing up at the Vend-A-Goat convention?

      I wonder if this is a spinoff from the software used in LV gambling establishments where if someone is banned from one casino on the Strip, they are banned from all of them, and security heads for them the second they step in the door.

      When I first read this article, I thought "Tripwire", which to me, is a useful product, and used properly, it wouldn't be surprising for people to tamper with some machines, Tripwire catch it on a subsequent system scan come audit time, and wind up getting caught, especially here in Texas.

  9. Evidence Based Surveillance by TerryC101 · · Score: 1

    Expecting to have an Evidence Based Surveillance Policy is like expecting to have Evidence Based Drugs Policy.

  10. Stop with the cop bashing. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    DPS stands for department of public safety. The Dallas police have nothing to do with this article if you actually read it. I have family in the Dallas police department, and let me assure you, they are not playing with toys all day long. I wish people would actually look into crime rates and whats actually going on all around them before they start cop bashing. Life is nice and comfy behind a computer screen, but it's far from the truth.

    1. Re:Stop with the cop bashing. by Guy+From+V · · Score: 1

      Someone with cops in their family defending the integrity of cops? It must be true, then.

    2. Re:Stop with the cop bashing. by mr_mischief · · Score: 2

      Do you mean we should look at the crime rates that took a precipitous fall in the mid 1990s? Those crime rates you want us to look at? The ones that have been falling ever since, even through the worst recession in decades? How much more spending on putting "broken window" offenders in expensive prisons do we need to stave off this unfortunate fall in crime? We need crime to look so bad and scary so the people will keep letting their governments spend disproportionate amounts of money imprisoning people for victimless crimes. How else will the prison lobbies bring home the bacon to their masters?

  11. Lies and more lies.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The state is getting more corrupt than the criminals, when do we get to decide which one we would rather get ripped off by?

    1. Re:Lies and more lies.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Act now and you can have both!

    2. Re:Lies and more lies.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The police are allowed to lie. Ask them if they lie and they'll lie about that, too.

  12. TripWire's "Security News" Listing by zawarski · · Score: 1

    How surprising ... Heritage Foundation, National Post, (3x) Fox News... oh and one from PBS.