Should Cops Wear Google Glass?

Nerval's Lobster writes "Over at The Kernel, staff writer Greg Stevens wonders whether police departments around the world should outfit their officers with Google Glass. There's some logic behind the idea. A cop with wearable electronics constantly streaming audio and video back to a supervisor (or even a Website) would be less likely, at least in theory, to take liberties with civilians' civil liberties. But not everybody thinks it's such a good idea. Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst with the ACLU's Speech, Privacy and Technology Project, wrote in a recent blog posting that society needs to make choices 'about the extent to which we want to allow the government to store up that data so that it has the power to hit 'rewind' on everybody's lives.' In the view of that organization, 'that's just too much power.' That being said, law enforcement wearing electronics that streams constant video and audio data would still be subject to the law. 'If the officer is recording a communication he has in public with someone, there's probably no wiretap problem since there's at least the consent of one party and no expectation of privacy,' Hanni M. Fakhoury, a staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, wrote in an email to Slashdot. 'But if he's recording peripheral communications between two separate individuals, than there's potential wiretap liability depending on the circumstances.' What do you think? Are cops wearing Google Glass (or similar wearable electronic) a good idea?"

Just for video recording?

[timeOday]

I don't understand why so much of the focus on google glass is on the video camera. Lots of devices can record video, that's nothing new.

If police should be wearing google glass, it would be because it can provide heads up information, as opposed to the rather bulky laptop-based systems now in their cruisers.

A good idea with one condition

[russotto]

If the recording is "missing" for any reason, or if the cop stops recording or removes the recording device for any reason other than someone else breaking it (and visibly doing so), everything the cop says about the unrecorded events should be assumed to be a lie.

The streams have to be restricted

[msobkow]

The streams from these "cop cameras" have to be restricted so that they can only be accessed by the officer's supervisors and with a subpoena. I strongly object to the proposals some have made that the footage be made public. I do not want my every interaction with the police made public, even if it's getting a jaywalking ticket.

"Innocent until proven guilty" can't be achieved when facing the court of public opinion.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Who watches the watchers

[VernonNemitz]

The answer to that ancient question, because we can actually do it with today's tech, is "everyone". So all public buildings and public/government vehicles should be wired with webcams that anyone can access at any time to see what Public Servants are actually doing (instead of what they claim to be doing). Remember Heinlein's "Notebooks of Lazarus Long", and the particular quotation "Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny." Cops that can do things without being watched are in a position to abuse power just like any other tyrant.

Re:A good idea with one condition

[Zero__Kelvin]

No. You are right. Malfunctions happen on a regular basis. The fact that they only happen when it benefits the cop, and never when it would incriminate them is pure coincidence.

Since you clearly have little experience dealing with the police, or worse yet, are one yourself, how about letting the people who actually have experience with the many, many criminals wearing badges do the analysis. Thanks.

Re:Who watches the watchers

[currently_awake]

Allowing the general public to see the video without a warrant means people can spy on you (using the government cameras) and therefore invade your privacy. If a police officer questions you about something, it would end up on the internet even if the accusation was provably false. Also it means criminals can map out where the cops go (or don't go) in order to find gaps for criminal activity.

Re:Who watches the watchers

[Anonymous Coward]

How often do you actually hear about a police officer in America doing something wrong on national tv? Very rarely, even locally I barely ever hear about that

That is because the mainstream media is in bed with the government and cover up a lot of shit. It's the same reason you rarely hear about all of the unsolved crimes and the criminals who do get away. They are trying to save face and retain power.

Re:Who watches the watchers

[PopeRatzo]

How often do you actually hear about a police officer in America doing something wrong on national tv?

And from that you take away that police seldom do anything wrong?

By your logic, "Honey, I've told you I've never cheated on you, so that's proof I'm not cheating on you!"

My mother was a cop, and my uncle a us marshall your ideas of cops sneaking around and all of them doing illegal things like legalized crooks is hilariously stupid

Nobody says that "all of them" are doing illegal things. But they're supposed to be held to a much higher standard than the rest of us, because they're the ones who have power.

Here in Chicago, we went through decades where a Division Commander was running a torture regime which put scores of people in jail and on death row by torturing confessions out of them. For the decades that was happening, nobody heard about it, so by your standard, it wasn't happening.

It doesn't take a big percentage of crooked cops to put the entire system at risk. Just ask the people over at the Innocence Project, who have, as of now, gotten over 300 people off death row by using DNA evidence, about the damage police misconduct and prosecutorial overreach does. Ask one of those guys who were waiting for a lethal injection until a group of volunteers peeked under the skirts of police departments and found something very foul.

Most cops I know are a lot less sanguine than you are about police misconduct, which splashed mud on them and makes their job a lot harder. Every one of them can tell you stories of bad cops and the damage they do.

Re:Who watches the watchers

[icebike]

That is because the mainstream media is in bed with the government and cover up a lot of shit. It's the same reason you rarely hear about all of the unsolved crimes and the criminals who do get away. They are trying to save face and retain power.

I would hate to live in a society that had enough cops to be sure there are no unsolved crimes and criminals never get away.
Be very careful what you ask for Mr. Anonymous Coward.

Re:Just for video recording?

[icebike]

I doubt the database is national.

But its not warranted in any case.

The old saw is that you have no expectation of privacy in public. But that is merely a play on words, and is a shallow argument.

We have an expectation of going about our business without being tracked, and stalked by authorities (or anyone else) for no reason at all.
The public space is owned equally by all, and simply because you walk down a sidewalk or drive down a road there is no valid reason for the government to record that event, or to be able to prove that you did walk or drive there. Its not their space. Its OUR space. Privacy by virtue of anonymity in public is the normal expectation in a large urban area. The chances of meeting someone on the street that recognizes you is inversely proportional to the population density, and that is the natural condition that humans have had forever. Because it is possible to eliminate this natural anonymity doesn't make it right just because you are in a public place.

If someone followed you around, you could call the cops on them, and they would be questioned and detained long enough for you to at least get out of sight. Unless they were a cop themselves. But somehow police get this right for no reason at all.

All stolen/wanted vehicle plate numbers should be downloaded to these police cars, and the plate recognition software should check against THAT LIST ONLY, and immediately discard any other recognized plate number. Don't allow it to be kept for even 10 seconds.

Its pointless to even allow this functionality at all, because when a vehicle is stolen the first thing that happens is that the plates are changed out. The focus is not to recover stolen vehicles. Its to keep tabs on everybody.

Re:Just for video recording?

[jpublic]

That's simply bad logic. Just because you believe that his opinion would change if he suffered from a tragedy such as that doesn't mean that his opinion actually would change, or that it invalidates his current point of view; it's just a non sequitur.

Second of all, are people who had such horrible experiences the only ones with valid opinions? In that case, we should let victims of crimes be judges, juries, and executioners; that's not how we work. In reality, people who experience such things tend to be extremely emotional and less likely to be rational when it comes to speaking about related issues.

If those weren't the points you intended to convey, then I have no inkling as to what purpose your comment was supposed to serve.