London Police Credit CCTV Cameras With Six Solved Crimes Per Day 280
stoilis writes "CCTV cameras across London help solve almost six crimes a day, the Metropolitan Police has said. According to the article, 'the number of suspects who were identified using the cameras went up from 1,970 in 2009 to 2,512 this year. The rise in the number of criminals caught also raises public confidence and counters bad publicity for CCTV.'"
Categories (Score:5, Interesting)
FTA: "The Met said among the 2,512 suspects caught this year, four were suspected murderers, 23 rapists and sex attackers and five wanted gunmen."
But, what were the other 2,479 (98.7%)?
Re:Categories (Score:5, Insightful)
FTA: "The Met said among the 2,512 suspects caught this year, four were suspected murderers, 23 rapists and sex attackers and five wanted gunmen."
But, what were the other 2,479 (98.7%)?
TFA also doesn't say anything about convictions either.
Re:Categories (Score:5, Insightful)
Doesn't this basically say "we caught some people who may or may not have committed a crime"?!
And what's with the misleading article title about six crimes "solved" and all they mention in the article were people who were caught that were suspected of a crime? This whole article doesn't add up.
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Jaywalkers, I guess.
But put it this way: 2512 suspects were caught, among them suspected murderers, rapists and gunmen. That sounds awesome, doesn't it?
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Jaywalking isn't a crime [wikipedia.org] in the UK, except on a Motorway (where pedestrians aren't allowed).
If I had to guess, I'd guess they were drink related [wikipedia.org] - vandalism, fighting, etc.
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In the UK (as with most of Europe) pedestrians always have right of way on a public road over wheeled vehicles. Possibly this goes back as far as Roman times. The motorway situation is somewhat more complex since they are still public roads, a pedestrian on one is tresspassing. So you have two different laws interacting.
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In the UK (as with most of Europe) pedestrians always have right of way on a public road over wheeled vehicles.
You may well be correct about Europe but that's not strictly true in the UK. While the Highway Code makes provision for pedestrians, it is not criminal law but can be the basis for civil law. Section 38 of the Road Traffic Act 1988 [legislation.gov.uk]:
A failure on the part of a person to observe a provision of the Highway Code shall not of itself render that person liable to criminal proceedings of any kind but any such failure may in any proceedings (whether civil or criminal, and including proceedings for an offence under the Traffic Acts, the Public Passenger Vehicles Act 1981 or sections 18 to 23 of the Transport Act 1985) be relied upon by any party to the proceedings as tending to establish or negative any liability which is in question in those proceedings.
IANAL but I think this confusion comes from rule 170 in the highway code:
Watch out for pedestrians crossing a road into which you are turning. If they have started to cross they have priority, so give way.
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Ohh, what's really going to bake your noodle later on is knowing that it wasn't until after the suspects were picked up for something else that they discovered they were suspected murderers, rapists and gunmen... ;-)
Re:Categories (Score:5, Funny)
People creating a public disturbance by flipping off CCTV cameras.
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"..2,512 suspects caught this year, four were suspected murderers, 23 rapists and sex attackers and five wanted gunmen."
IOW they identified people on camera where they already knew how they were looking.
Or at least they looked similar to those, as their lawyers will say.
I'm sure they saw Bin Laden and Elvis several times too.
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Mostly traffic offences; minor speeding, running red lights, illegal parking.
Solve yes... (Score:2)
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Solve, sure. Prevent? Clearly no. Cameras do not prevent crime; only assist in prosecuting.
You can't really say that for sure. It would be very hard to get stats on crimes that never happened.
You can't just compare the overall crimes stats between now and before the cameras because while some crimes are prevented, other crimes that wouldn't have been reported are now reported due to greater confidence in police action because of the CCTV cameras.
Re:Solve yes... (Score:5, Interesting)
Sure you can: http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/linkscopy/GlasgowCCTV.html [ratical.org]
The drop in crime with cameras is the exact same as the drop in crime everywhere. If the cameras themselves had anything to do with it, you'd see a larger drop in crime where they're used.
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Whilst the Glasgow fall in crime was not deemed to be significantly greater than the fall in crime in the control areas, the sister study in Airdrie DID indicate a statistically significant fall in the CCTV area, greater than in the control areas.
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/1998/12/978abe73-d412-4ea3-86a7-e5acf24c8d7a [scotland.gov.uk]
The GP is right in that many studies simply don't come to a conclusion because of the difficulty establishing statistical significance. Not because crime didn't fall.
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They also contribute generously to the Met's collection of photos of people wearing hoods.
Reading up on this more I found... (Score:2)
Reading up on this more I also saw what the BBC reported with dailymail [dailymail.co.uk] that
But Detective Chief Inspector Mick Neville said Scotland Yard has revolutionized the use of CCTV by treating it like DNA or fingerprints.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1342010/Town-halls-squander-315m-CCTV-years-despite-massive-job-cuts.html#ixzz19OAaItlR [dailymail.co.uk]
Treated like DNA eh?
Granted this isn't the same era as 12 Angry Men where the woman's eyesight is called into question (aha cameras!), but still it leaves much to be desired unless a clear shot is gained. Being that I do not know much about what is judged as clear, anyone care to help clarify this here for me? Is there some confidence interval? Do they run facial recognition? (Perhaps I just have bad reading comprehension haha)
P
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i suspect the quality is better then in-store cameras. as they may be from the early VHS era (complete with a single tape that have been recycled for decades).
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Like DNA and fingerprints suggests two possibilities.
1) Storage of images of suspects in a database.
2) Technology that searches such a database of images for biometric patterns. Such technology does exist to identify people from metrics of facial features in images.
Oh boy, what's that cost per crime down to? (Score:4, Informative)
A large proportion of the cash has been In London, where an estimated £200 million so far has been spent on the cameras. This suggests that each crime has cost £20,000 to detect.
From: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/6082530/1000-CCTV-cameras-to-solve-just-one-crime-Met-Police-admits.html [telegraph.co.uk] (1.5 years ago)
Re:Oh boy, what's that cost per crime down to? (Score:4, Informative)
Actually: The Met said among the 2,512 suspects caught this year, four were suspected murderers, 23 rapists and sex attackers and five wanted gunmen.
So the reality is 32 quality collars. Which makes it about £6 million each to detect.
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Economics must not dictate situations which are obviously religious.
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No, it is actually the other way around. Most of these Police CCTV systems are installed under PFI which means the costs to the public purse rises over their life-time.
HTH
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No that doesn't help unless you provide evidence or even an argument, rather than just an empty statement.
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PFI == the Private Finance Initiative [wikipedia.org]
Essentially, the cameras are built by a private company, with private money, and run by the private company, for the state. The private company has used it's dodgy lobbyists to get a sweetheart contract for some inordinately ludicrous fee.
The contracts involved typically have basically zero risk in them for the corporation involved. The fees are guaranteed to increase each year above the rate of inflation, the duration of the contract (and they are long as 35 years) is g
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Let us be thankful we have commerce. Buy more. Buy more now. Buy. And be happy.
treated like fingerprints and DNA? (Score:2)
Det Ch Insp Mick Neville, who heads the Met's identification unit, said CCTV images were "treated like fingerprints and DNA" by the force.
Does that mean that now, because it is all digital, they keep the recordings forever, even if no one on a particular recording is suspected of, or committed, any crime at all?
Only 0.1% of crimes get solved with cameras (Score:3, Interesting)
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Thing is, how many of those crimes could have been solved without those cameras?
You know, by people doing detective work? Neat thing about using that method ... it isn't 1984 like...
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One per ten thousand cameras.
0.01% at best. Per day. Annually, the success rate is up to a whopping 3.58%....
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Next step (Score:2)
Inbed Identity chips into all citizens so that scanners can keep track of where you are. Actually, they already do this with pets....
Sure it sounds scary now, but just wait until Google partners with Facebook and Twitter: Now with FREE tracking chip integration (with maps, streetview, always on live augmented reality!) Get chipped today!
Everyone will sign up!
Brits Sure Must Be Well Mannered! (Score:3)
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TFA's CCTV cameras are not red-light cameras. In the UK red-light cameras are operated quite differently to the CCTV systems under discussion here, and are almost totally automated. IIRC after a high speed chase it is so difficult to pull the images, if any, from the red-light cameras that often they don't bother and instead rely on the video from a pursuit car or helicopter.
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Appreciate that in outlining the technology your elucidation underscores the reality that it still all comes down to real police work.
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You took that so very well! Rather than a degrading "Woosh!", you acknowledge the poster's literal assessment and even profer a self-deprecating explanation. With this degree of civility, you too could be British! If you're also patient and calm in queues, and enjoy tea and crumpets, I suspect you'd pass any residency testing with flying colors!
* Rather, colours. See - I'd need to re-sit.
False accusations (Score:2)
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Wow you're claiming being filmed by a CCTV camera is the same as a false accusation. Congratulations, on a page full of paranoid nut jobs, you are the craziest.
SOLVED crimes? Or 'DETECTED' crimes (Score:5, Informative)
Precrime (Score:2)
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Sure they're entitled to their say in everything (provided that they respect the rules their job with various bits of sensitive info). It's not like the government dictates what they say.
Sorry if this doesn't jive with non-British
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You'd have to actually read through those blogs in order to find out how the British police fiddle the crime stats. There isn't a single link to the evidence you want - because if such a link were provided, anyone could look at it and declare it invalid and incomplete. It would, after all, be an anecdote about life in the police with an assurance that "it's always like this" and a few dozen comments saying "yes, it's like that at our nick, too".
It would take dozens (perhaps hundreds) of links to make the ca
imaginative testimony (Score:3)
"imaginative testimony" by the police is a staple of British comedy. How do we know that this is not more of the same? Further, to be of any real value, the camera would have to solve enough ADDITIONAL crimes, over and above what would have been solved by "regular" police work to repay, at least, all of the expense of installing and maintaining them in reduced cost of police and/or other losses, and the report just doesn't even hint at that.
Prevented? (Score:2)
While I realize it's hard to measure, I would be interested to know to what extend CCTV prevents crimes rather than solve them. It sounds like the criminals mentioned still managed to commit their crime. They *may* be prevented from future crimes (unlikely for petty crimes in UK), but other than a mild feeling of justice that doesn't help the victims much.
I would also like to know how many crimes were registered by CCTV camera's but could not be solved. This would help to understand how well these camera's
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Try Google.
Cops rubbing hands in glee after student protests (Score:2)
I bet the cops loved the fact they could use all the CCTV recognition from the recent student protests against cuts and austerity measures to boost their CCTV statistics.
The gap between the old and the new (Score:3)
As this now seems a distant memory for some, the push is now on to keep the budgets and mindset.
GCHQ is doing net tracking and voice prints. The revenue issues of OCR vehicle license plates is also fun.
CCTV seems to be waiting for something. When the UK gov needs mass face recognition after random net organised riots?
"Cameraman filmed Hungarian revolt" http://articles.latimes.com/2008/may/11/local/me-miko11 [latimes.com]" Miko was shocked to learn that the Soviets had found and confiscated the footage in his locker and were using it to identify people."
Any real threat will be one way, as the IRA showed or false flag/state sponsored groups seem to understand their missions will be one way or testing ect.
Public confidence is low as they have a feel for how this system is going to be upgraded.
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AFAIK the only place that had CCTV cameras to combat IRA terrorism was the CIty of London. (For non Brits, that's just a one square mile financial area within london, not the whole of London, or even the centre of London.)
Of course islamic terrorism has replaced IRA terrorism. And for sure CCTV has foile
Not so great for the victim (Score:5, Insightful)
not normalized per crime rate (Score:2)
"the number of suspects who were identified using the cameras went up from 1,970 in 2009 to 2,512 this year. "
In every single article posted on slashdot lately. Every single freaking article...
DO THE FREAKING NORMALIZATION IN YOUR FREAKING STUDIES
Video storage of thousands of cameras? (Score:2)
The data is very weasely... (Score:3)
Then we have "The number of suspects who were identified using the cameras went up from 1,970 in 2009 to 2,512 this year."
How many perps? Well "The Met said among the 2,512 suspects caught this year, four were suspected murderers, 23 rapists and sex attackers and five wanted gunmen.". That adds up to 32 to me... for how many CCTVs in the Metro area of London?
Just can't understand.... (Score:4, Insightful)
I just don't get why the Brits aren't more upset at the establishment 'keeping any eye' on them 24/7. Its already been proven that given the # of laws on the books NO-ONE can avoid committing an infraction against the law. A camera system that extensive means the gov't has the ability or at least the means to prosecute just about everyone in the country. Not to mention that treating everyone in the country as lawbreakers would do nothing more than enforce bad behavior, or at least anti-social behavior. I would think everyone would be walking around with Anonymous masks in public just to keep the illusion of privacy... or is anonymity illegal too?
Caught, but not prevented (Score:3)
Of course installing cameras helps in identification and prosecution of criminals. What these statistics don't mention is that the overall crime rate is more or less unchanged before/after the cameras. I'm all for prosecuting criminals, but these statistics are selected to make it seem like the cameras improve safety or reduce the cost of crime, and neither of those things is true -- this is an attempt to reframe the discussion from "cameras keep us safe", which they clearly don't to "cameras catch criminals" which is true but not what was promised.
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:4, Insightful)
Especially as most people convicted aren't actually punished anyway. What's the point in using expensive technology to catch a thief then just giving him a small fine or a caution?
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:5, Insightful)
What's the point of giving petty* thieves more than a small fine or a caution upon conviction?
Should everyone, no matter how minor or severe the infraction, be sent to Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison [youtube.com], where they get to make big rocks into little rocks until they die and get buried under a small white cross across the way from their cell?
Should the presence of video evidence, or the lack thereof, contribute to such sentencing? Or perhaps more importantly: Should the expense of such video evidence be a factor in the sentencing?
Discuss.
*: I wanted to use the word "minor" there, as in "minor infraction." But that might be confused with "minors," so I didn't use that word. "Petty" is the best I could come up with, though it doesn't quite fit either, but at the same time I wanted to be concise. In a twist of irony, in the course failing to conjure a better adjective than "minor" for the sake of being concise, it seems that this footnote has eliminated all concision in an attempt to explain my choice of words lest they be misconstrued by the pedants here (of which I am one). Bummer.
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Should everyone, no matter how minor or severe the infraction, be sent to Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison [youtube.com], where they get to make big rocks into little rocks until they die and get buried under a small white cross across the way from their cell?
Nope, but I think we could make more of a point about where they're headed if they continue down that road; eg. A second offense could earn them a mandatory seven days banged up with somebody unpleasant, just to give them a taste of what "grown-up" prison is like.
It's got to be better than the stupid ASBO system - which just teaches them that the police have no real power over them.
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem is that sentencing in the UK is pretty lax for non-petty crimes [menmedia.co.uk] as well. And victims are often prosecuted if they do anything to try to protect themselves. It's a system that rewards violence, punishes resistance, and doesn't provide any incentive to change for the criminals.
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's why Britain has sky-high crime rates compared to execution-happy Texas.
Oh wait....
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:4, Informative)
The first point you make is true, at least if you consider non-custodial sentencing to be lax, although I don't agree with you that it's a bad thing; in the UK at least prison governors have repeatedly stated that imposing short custodial sentences leads to increased reoffending because it disrupts the person's life, often leaving them unemployed and homeless on their release, but doesn't give them enough time inside to receive useful training or counselling.
The second point, though, is the one I really wanted to respond to, as it is a complete untruth. UK law, to summarise enormously, allows anyone to respond to a perceived threat with a reasonable amount of force. It also accepts that people cannot be expected to weigh the amount of force required exactly in the heat of the moment and therefore gives them a great deal of leeway. What's more, the CPS guidelines, as well as containing the general proposition that prosecution should only be undertaken where it is in the public interest, also states that "it is important to ensure that all those acting in good faith to defend themselves, their family, their property, or in the prevention of crime or the apprehension of offenders are not prosecuted for their actions". It is only where the degree of force used is manifestly disproportionate (as in the case some time ago of a 20-something-year-old man who was pushed on the shoulder by a pensioner and "defended himself" by punching the man to death) or where it has crossed the line from self-defence to vigilantism that a prosecution will even be begun, let alone a conviction secured.
The tabloid media regularly stir up controversy by claiming that people are being prosecuted for defending themselves from violent criminals. I am yet to encounter a single case of this nature in which a person has been sentenced for what was in actuality self defence (take, for example, the Tony Martin case, portrayed by the tabloids as reasonable self defence, but where even a cursory inspection of the case report shows that the killing was pre-meditated and that his claims in court had been shown to be untrue; or the recent case where the media claimed a man had been imprisoned for defending his family, but where the "defence" took place after all danger had passed, when the father had rounded up some friends, armed himself and beaten the assailant almost to death on the street). Repeated Government reviews have come to the same conclusion; there is simply no foundation to the claim that victims are prosecuted for reasonable self defence.
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I'm afraid that that simply isn't true. Reasonable is not be defined as "lawful", and logical consideration makes it clear that to say that it is would be an absurdity; the function of a defence of self defence being to make what would otherwise be unlawful lawful, it would make no sense for legality to be a prerequisite.
Stabbing an intruder with a locking knife (which is, I assume, what a "lockback" is - I'm not familiar with the term) will not necessarily mean the force used was not reasonable. (Note two
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Note, before you mark this as a troll, mods, note that this refers not to "human rights" per se but the EU Constitution's idea of what a "human right" is.
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Actually, Legalism is more to blame.
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Just a scapegoat. The same trend (very low crime in 1900, crazy crime rate by 2000) has occurred outside EU influence, for example in New Zealand and some parts of America. I'm not saying that the ECHR isn't part of the problem, but it is certainly not the cause.
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-The European Convention on Human Rights, which is what you're probably talking about, isn't part of EU jurisprudence.
-The ECHR was ratified by the UK in 1953, and has shaped UK law since then. It is not a recent influence, although recourse to the ECHR is easier since the 1998 Human Rights Act
-The ECHR was drafted largely by English lawyers and draftsmen, and the UK had a great deal of influence. As a result it contains very little that was not drawn from already-existent English law.
-The rights conferred
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The "right to a family" has allowed a failed asylum seeker, who murdered a little girl by dragging her along a road under the car he was druving without a licence, tax or insurance, to claim that deporting him would be such an infringement of his human rights, it can't happen - and the judges agreed.
This is despite the fact he is no longer in a relationship with the childrens mother.
Steve
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* citation needed.
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but AIUI, he has no contact WITH his children.
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The belief means that people don't know where the safe boundaries for self-defence are. Can I hit an intruder over the head with a cricket bat? Can I stab him? Can I shoot him with the high-powered projectile weaponry I have in the house?
The answer is a complex 'yes' depending on circumstances. If I'm in genuine fear of my life then lethal force is permitted, but the moment he's down and incapable any further action that causes him harm is assault.
Can I make that snap call in the heat of a violent intrusion
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Oh, and install a phone-home virus on it so that if they plug it into a PC I can tell the police how to find them.
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Your ideas have been tried in Britain... down to the letter. Incentives and opportunities - done it. "Prison makes bad people worse" - done it.
They don't work.
Even now, our "conservative" Home Secretary is parroting the same old lines about "community punishments" that we've been hearing for decades. He says exactly what you say - which is exactly what all of his recent predecessors have said. As if just a bit more leniency, understanding, incentive, opportunity will suddenly make all the difference. If it
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Are you sure? But you say crime is caused by:No, I don't. I said *some* crime is caused by that.
Am I to understand that you believe if society were improved, such that there was (1) no desperation and (2) violence was not condoned, then crime would be isolated and rare?
Some types of crime certainly would be.
If so, then I think my statement, "You seem to be saying that crime happens because society is broken", is actually quite an accurate summary. "Widespread compliance" will be achieved naturally, y
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Should everyone, no matter how minor or severe the infraction, be sent to Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison [youtube.com],
Where is this "Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison you speak of? Someone at work took my stapler so I'd like to arrange for him/her to be sent there once convicted!
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:5, Interesting)
They are right, they caught me doing an illegal right turn on a scooter with CCTV and sent me a ticket. Crime +1.
However, when I was hit by a hit and run driver under such a camera, flew over the bonnet but managed to get their license plate number and call it in immediately. Nada. They wouldn't even go around to the persons place where the car was registered and the investigation unit told me they would *never* go around to someone's place for a hit and run unless there was serious injury inflicted and then repeated *serious*.
When I left a bag behind in the Eurostar with expensive camera lens and called it in immediately. When I got the bag back there was a lens from 300 quid missing. I called the transport police. I thought they would have trouble seeing the lens on the screen but he reported that he couldn't identify me. Despite that I was wearing motorcycle gear and arrying a motocycle topbox. I suspect he didn't even look.
So yeah. They are definately used to give tickets to criminals breaking traffic laws and for parking illegally as well.And they have been seen to be peering deep into people's bedrooms. Possibly they are used in very large crimes, but when the policitians talk crime I imagine that most people think of across the spectrum crime. If they knew that in reality 95% of all crime that could benefit from CCTV detection it isn't even bothered with they might think differently. Joe public won't have a clue unless they can tally it up against personal experience and in my case it sucks.
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Heh, and here is some more anecdotal evidence.
1. Van parked in loading bay for ten minutes while the load was being delivered and the return load was being dragged to the van ( ie the van was unmanned for ten minutes ). Result - Vehicle's registered owner hit by hundred and something quid fine.
2. Taxi reverses into my car and stoves in the passenger side doors, then drives away. Result - Cops say the registered owner cannot find out who was driving at the time so they (the cops) can't do anything.
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I can't stop it.
(There! Top that!) ;)
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And going and doing other things (other things?) is so much more healthful.
Oh, wait. I don't get along with anyone out there than I do here. Exercise in solitude in 3..2..1...
Next!
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Or then, it could just be that people are hard-wired to not change opinions. And whether by genetics coupled with the greater fuckwad theory or Asperger's/OCD, the resu
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Haven't you noticed that no one will ever admit fault or error, nor even change their opinion in the slightest when presented with overwhelming evidence to the contrary? The only reason Wikipedia is slammed so hard here is that it's a great resource to exposing lazy (because they won't look it up) idiots who have incomprehensible opinions. Or then, it could just be that people are hard-wired to not change opinions. And whether by genetics coupled with the greater fuckwad theory or Asperger's/OCD, the result is the same.
It happens occasionally. Though I can't think of a time when a poster actually admitted they'd changed there opinion.
Slashdot posts have changed my opinion many times. Why only this morning I was forced to reconsider my former opposition to retroactive abortion...
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Maybe if they stick a camera up my arse, they could help me with my hemorrhoids!
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But then you'd have polaroids, which can be much more painful.
For all the /. whining about camera's (Score:2, Interesting)
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As far as I can see, the reason "no one complains" is that the existtence of so-called private networks is concatenated into the whole problem of cameras in general.
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They aren't on "film" either. They are on tape or digital image. Details *are* important if you are trying to make a point.
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:5, Insightful)
Last year, the headline was "One Crime Solved Per 1,000 London CCTV Cameras [slashdot.org]".
The rate can't be much better this year.
- RG>
Well, it would seem to be much better.
From the article, there's just under 60,000 cameras now. Six crimes solved per day times 365 days = about 2,200 crimes solved. So that's about one crime solved per 30 cameras per year.
Going from 1/1000 to 1/30 is a massive improvement, though I'm guessing that the difference isn't just the police program reaching maturity or something like that. For starters, I'll bet they count crimes differently between the two programs.
Still, even the modern figure seems pretty bad. So you've got 30 cameras up all year, with all the needed infrastructure behind these 30 cameras, and all together, they solved one crime. A quarter million hours of surveillance (30 cameras * 24 hours * 365 days) and you only solve one crime.
It doesn't make sense, does it? (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe they are just lying.
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The Met are proven liars at the highest level:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1496382/Shot-Brazilian-did-not-jump-barrier-and-run.html
The police in the UK have lost even the middle classes and are very unpopular.
The spread of CCTV under Nu Labour is just another illustration of how close socialism is to fascism. The UK is a turn-key fascist state and we will probably tip into that once we fall off the finance cliff.
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The spread of CCTV under Nu Labour is just another illustration of how close socialism is to fascism.
What had NuLabour got to do with socialism?
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From the article, there's just under 60,000 cameras now.
That's not a reliable figure, though. There is no official figures for the number of CCTVs in use in the UK, and some very dodgy statistics [channel4.com] have a very long life. The figure of 60000 comes from a campaign group opposed to CCTV so it is likely to err on the high side.
Re:Cost:Benefit? (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, it would seem to be much better.
From the article, there's just under 60,000 cameras now. Six crimes solved per day times 365 days = about 2,200 crimes solved. So that's about one crime solved per 30 cameras per year.
Going from 1/1000 to 1/30 is a massive improvement, though I'm guessing that the difference isn't just the police program reaching maturity or something like that. For starters, I'll bet they count crimes differently between the two programs.
Still, even the modern figure seems pretty bad. So you've got 30 cameras up all year, with all the needed infrastructure behind these 30 cameras, and all together, they solved one crime. A quarter million hours of surveillance (30 cameras * 24 hours * 365 days) and you only solve one crime.
Apples and oranges I'm afraid. TFA refers to 2,512 crimes solved with the help of CCTV in London, while the just under 60,000 cameras refers to the whole of Britain. This figure also, I assume, refers to ones with a police or other government agency employee at the other end, but from the text the chap from the Met appears to be referring to all forms of CCTV.
Even if the figures were all apples-to-apples they wouldn't be worth analysing anyway. What does "help solve" mean? Actually, I'm a bit concerned what they mean by "crimes" since they later see fit to reduce it to "suspects caught", oh and by the way those 4 "suspected murderers" - suspected? I thought these crimes were solved?
What do they mean "five wanted gunmen"? So... Are we saying the CCTV merely helped them locate people they were already looking for? That has value and everything but the further we get through the article the further we get away from the initial impression where CCTV stills are being paraded in court as Exhibit A.
The entire article is meaningless gibberish. The most I can take from it is that this is the best the Met can do to talk up the effectiveness of the cameras. On the plus side, they are clearly really really bad at fudging the data to look good.
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And even better, Number of crimes prevented: A big fat zero.
Thoughtcrime is getting harder every day, but at least it's still possible.
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And even better, Number of crimes prevented: A big fat zero.
[citation needed]
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Orwell was so smart, but not in the way people think. We shouldn't see it as a warning so much as a suggestion! Who's with me? Come on! If you're not with me you're against me. You're not a terrorist, are you?!
Blair, Eric Blair
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And that would just be the beginning! We'll be living in Utopia in no time.
Right?
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Everything will be all right. You are in my hands. I am here to protect you. You have nowhere to go. You have nowhere to go.
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Sounds like at that point he was referring to problems retrieving video held by private individuals/organisations. Not the stuff from police/council camera networks.