Police Given Access to Congestion-Charge Cameras 293
The BBC is reporting that anti-terror Police officers in London have been given live access to the "congestion charge cameras", allowing them to view and track vehicles in real time. This is a change from the original procedure that required them to apply for access on a case-by-case basis. "Under the new rules, anti-terror officers will be able to view pictures in "real time" from Transport for London's (Tfl) 1,500 cameras, which use Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) technology to link cars with owners' details. But they will only be able to use the data for national security purposes and not to fight ordinary crime, the Home Office stressed."
Can you taste that? (Score:4, Insightful)
The best part. (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, for now.
Slope: Slippery (Score:2, Insightful)
yeah but... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The best part. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is why you don't give a mouse a cookie...
you mean, "on the record," right? (Score:5, Insightful)
If the anti-terror Police officers in London are anything like the anti-terror officers in the States, I would suspect that public acknowledgment means it's been going on for a decade, minimum.
New Rules? (Score:5, Insightful)
Until, of course, they change the rules again.
Beauuutiful example (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The best part. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The best part. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, that'll last. (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder how long that'll last... which is to say, I wonder for how long they've already been using the data to at least track ordinary crime, just waiting for the general public to give up caring enough that they can use the reams of data they've collected with impunity. Or whether we, over here in the USA, will even find out that this kind of technology exists and is being used.
Anything the government can use against its citizens, it probably already is, and if not, it's only because of technical limitations they're busily trying to fix.
Re:Hm (Score:5, Insightful)
It always seems reasonable until it becomes too late to change it.
Jean Charles de Menezes (Score:5, Insightful)
No, *this* is the best part (Score:3, Insightful)
That "enduring threat" seems to consist of two recent attempts, both bungled by incompetent notscaryists, to let off car bombs in central London using previously unknown vehicles. Remind me how tracking everyone everywhere is going to do anything whatsoever to prevent that happening again?
Re:The best part. (Score:1, Insightful)
If a bomb does go off - people will scream "Why didn't you prevent this! Look at the senseless loss of life! Our police are useless".
If the police use existing cameras to OBSERVE you; you become paranoid and delusional about police spying on you. Let's have just a wee bit of common sense. If the police were 1% as competent as you are giving them credit for; every murder would be solved, no mugger would walk the streets and all traffic fines would be collected. Car theft wouldn't exist, neither would rape, burlary or purse snatchers.
Best case - police solve more crimes.
Wost case - police watch you and I live our BORING lives. You are just not that important; no one cares what you do. Break some laws, well; then things are a wee bit different then.
Re:Considering how many muslims have invaded (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah, that's right. Kill the Muslims, because all 1.6 million [britishembassy.gov.uk] of them living in the UK must be terrorists!
Don't you even consider that if you tolerate all Muslims being murdered then maybe you'll be next? And that if all Muslims were terrorists then we'd have a full-scale civil war going on?
Just remember that most of those people who have 'invaded' are normal, peaceful, law abiding citizens. Stop reading The Sun and The Daily Mail, pull your head out of your arse and get a grip on reality. Please, for the sake of our society.
Ordinary crime Vs National Security (Score:3, Insightful)
Yep. (Score:2, Insightful)
Then, our Government(s) do things like the article with the blessing of the majority of folks thinking that they're "fighting" terrorism, when in fact, by reacting they way they are, they are playing right into the hands of the terrorists.
The terrorists want to cause terror and make us react in exactly the way we (the majority) have been - giving up our civil rights, running around panicking, and anytime there's even a threat of an attack, our level goes up to "Orange" or some such nonsense.
I don't know about you, but Osama and gang have been very effectual and are doing a great job winning the "War on Terror" (TM). (We're living in a state of terror - aren't we?)
I really can't blame the Governments too much because if they just say, "Shit happens and we can't panic. We'll work on this and bring these guys to justice. And in the meantime, let's see what we can do to stop this kind of activity in the World." It'll never happen because the general public wouldn't accept it.
Re:No, *this* is the best part (Score:1, Insightful)
I doubt this could ever be abused. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The best part. (Score:3, Insightful)
And once in a while, something funny, embarassing, or otherwise destructive to one's social character mysteriously shows up on YouTube or a BBC comedy show take-off of "funny videos". Mind you that you can be on your utmost best behavior in public, and still be a hapless victim caught up in someone else's asshattery.
Yeah no one cares too much about what you do as long as it's legal, moral and ethical. But if it's at least mildly entertaining, it's marketable, regardless of whether it's legal, moral, or ethical to do so.
I think the problem that most people have is despite the police being held accountable to very high standards of integrity, police are people, too. Abuse, while rare, still happens because of this fact. Thinking of it in another way, many people consider themselves to be under the constant watch of God. The police are not God, nor can they fully act in a godly, devine, and omnipotent manner. Why try to move them closer (albeit in a very small step) to the empowerment of such that they are incapable of handling? (Okay, there's my crack at philosophy for the day...)
I've said it before and I'll say it again: (Score:4, Insightful)
Whatever it is they're doing, whatever reason it is they give for it, if there's anything about it such that they say 'no, no, we'd never use it that way' - they're planning to do just that, just as soon as they can get away with it.
Re:The best part. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Oh no! (Score:3, Insightful)
You are right, anyone can see you on the street. Where you are wrong is that unlike the general passer by who sees you for a sec and then moves on, the police with cameras can ID you on the street. You have privacy through anonymity. With the advent of the always watching authority, you have lost the anonymity. Why can this not work both ways, would you be OK setting up cameras and allowing anyone on the internet to watch them? How about allowing the face recognition software and everyone passing the camera is ID'd and put on the internet? You are in public, you have no privacy, so you do not mind the world tuning in and watching you?
As to the police officer stopping you and fucking with you, you can always ask if you are under arrest. If he says "No" you thank him for his time and walk away. They can not follow you, they can not harass you, They can not just search you for no reason.
Oh, Regular Crime Just Isn't Good Enough (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh, we don't care about regular crime. Let it happen as much as you want. Heaven forbid that we might use possibly effective tools already in place to actually protect you and your property. Only terrorists are worth actually trying to give our best efforts towards.
You know, all things considered, I suspect the average Britain is in far more danger from ordinary crime, than from terrorism at this moment. And if a Terrorist isn't actually a Terrorist until he commits an act of Terrorism, then he's just an ordinary criminal up to that point, and will be left to purse his merry pursuits. What a crock!
I like the David Brin solution. Have cameras everywhere public, and allow everyone to access them at any time. No more secrets this way, and a lot less suspicion.
Let me take a wild guess (Score:2, Insightful)
Heck, one woman here in the States reported that the traffic cop who pulled her over ran a check on her recent purchases (thanks to the credit card datamines) and told her what type of underwear she had recently bought.
Let me also guess that you've never been the victim of sexual harassment.
There's a very good reason why it's a good thing to limit power of those on the government payroll. It's because this power corrupts. And absolute power corrupts absolutely.
I suppose you can live like a cog in a wheel, and always living under the threat of never trying to piss your masters off. But there's a price to paid for living free. And that price involves limiting the power of those who would enslave you.
Re:Yep. (Score:3, Insightful)
As far as folks in the UK are concerned, I guess you never heard of the IRA. That's the reason that to this day, you will not find any trash cans on most London streets.
Also, if you truly believe that police monitoring TRAFFIC cameras in the UK was one of the goals of the terrorists then I want to have words with your teachers.
The goals of terrorists are to get us to be terrified and to allow our Governments to continue the erosion of our privacy and Civil Liberties. Monitoring by Police, for whatever reason, is yet another means of said destruction of those liberties.
So while we should be vigilant we also should be thankful for the freedoms we have,
I am so grateful for them and love them so much, that I become quite angry when any one of them is eroded for achieving the sense of (false) security.
I have a several family members who would shove their Bronze Stars up your ass for saying that to me.
They have sadly let you down in both your education and critical thinking skills.
I'll be crying myself to sleep tonight because of that comment.
Nope, no slippery slope here. (Score:3, Insightful)
Like the old seatbelt law 'we cant use this to stop you even if we see you with out a belt on the road' but it 10 years they had seatbelt enforcement roadblocks, 'for our protection'.
Wake the hell up people and put your foot down.
No, can't taste it, but I got a better idea... (Score:2, Insightful)
a little obvious reason (Score:2, Insightful)
So, going down the pike to philly for a political rally in your car would have been private at one time, cuz no one would record it (unless you specifically are tailed) and the other people who happen to drive by wouldn't pay you a second thought cuz you're just another car on the road. Now...things are going to get to the point where a surveillance network can follow the whereabouts of ALL cars everywhere in most big cities. With cameras watching pedestrians on top of that, pretty much any dissident (by which I mean peaceful protesters) can be found and tracked and blackmailed/harassed much more efficiently. The anonymous "angry mob" that previous governments have had to please to survive can now be catalogued and effectively dealt with, striking fear into those who might think about joining them.
So there.
Re:The best part. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yep. And they weren't to be used for National Security purposes when installed.
This is why you don't give a mouse a cookie...
The same exact thing happened here in the US. We were told the cameras would not be used by law enforcement at all. Not that anyone really believed it.
Likewise the anti-terrorism laws (including the infamous PATRIOT act) were supposed to be "only for terrorists" but the reality is that they are much more often applied to ordinary crimes.
Bottom line, if there is data available people will use it, as long as they are clueful enough to do so.
Re:The best part. (Score:2, Insightful)
Congratulations sir... You are the people we are trying to get off the street. Please present yourself at your nearest police station with a full confession to each of these crimes and any others not detailed above.
Re:No, *this* is the best part (Score:3, Insightful)
I am quite willing to consider alternatives to my own viewpoint. I just think that the argument you make is a very dangerous one.
You focus on one side of the debate: the potential benefits of using cameras in this way. In fact, I would state the case for this more strongly than you do:
That clearly isn't true: use of cameras for crime prevention unquestionably is in the public interest.
The danger, which you gloss over in making your case, is that in allowing the use of cameras in ways that might prevent crimes, you also open the door to deliberate abuse and accidental mistakes.
For example, take your opening comment:
Did you know that one of the recent leaks suggested that simply driving along in front of or behind a suspect's vehicle could put your own car on a watch list?
Fortunately, we have a system of due process that guards against the dangers of guilt by association [wikipedia.org]. But then in your very next paragraph, you attempt to undermine this:
You make the flawed assumption that in such cases, someone will die if there is no time to convince a judge to award a warrant. Clearly this is not always the case. You also make the implicit assumption that if a judge declined to award a warrant in these circumstances, that would be a bad thing, rather than effectively protecting an innocent person from unreasonable persecution. This also is not necessarily true.
We live in a society where the government is increasingly taking your line, to the point that an innocent citizen can now have their freedoms abruptly curtailed just for being a suspect in an investigation. Freedoms that can be removed so easily are just illusions.
Of course, it's easy to rationalise this away. There's no smoke without fire, right? And anyway, it only applies to Bad People:
Unfortunately, this is simply not true [openrightsgroup.org]. They are deliberately tracking everybody, and as the statistics released under a Freedom of Information request earlier this week demonstrated, more than half of the people arrested in recent terrorism investigations have later been released without charge, so obviously the authorities do make mistakes, and often.
So I'm afraid I don't agree with you when you say this: