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Anatomy of a Killing

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Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#121

Post by dwd »

mherdeg wrote: post #28
dddddaviddddd wrote: post #10

It's fascinating to me that all the information required for the analysis is publicly available. This seems like a big shift from an era when only an intelligence agency would have been able to perform this sort of analysis.

The "open source intelligence" report on the MH17 incident -- where people found social media videos of the Buk missile proceeding through the countryside before being used to down the passenger jet -- was super interesting in a similar vein: https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/10/08/mh1...

This was a good blog at the time that did a reasonable effort compiling information from various sources. It was interesting how much could be gathered from the social media accounts of various soldiers and mercenaries. Note that it was tracking Russian vehicle movements before MH-17.

http://ukraineatwar.blogspot.com/

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#122

Post by nathan_f77 »

apo wrote: post #22

I can't imagine this kind of analysis carrying much weight in 3-5 years as advances in machine learning and image manipulation turn the notion of "seeing is believing" on its head. edit: Imagine running this process in reverse. Pick the culprit, time, and location. Then arrange the scene to exactly match the false accusation. Probably didn't happen here, but in a few years it won't be possible to know the difference.

I think you're probably right.

I wonder if smartphone makers could include some kind of hardware chip to verify the authenticity of videos. I don't think it's possible to build an unbreakable solution, but you could just make it very expensive.

The camera device could use a chip that included an HSM module, and it could use steganography to create verifiable videos. Each private key could be tied to a unique device ID in the maker's database. This might even be a legitimate use for blockchain. The device maker could create chainpoint proofs that include device IDs and public keys and embed them in Bitcoin transactions.

The HSM would be tamper-resistant, so it would be very expensive to extract the private key from the chip, or you'd have to collude with the device maker.

All of this is a moot point if you can just jailbreak the phone, fake the GPS and accelerometer data, put the camera in front of a screen, and play some audio into the microphones. I wonder if there are ways to detect video and audio that have been replayed through a projector/speaker instead of recorded in the real world. It's probably difficult to get it pixel perfect and replay perfect audio, and a neural net could probably be trained to spot any errors. Or maybe the projector/audio chip makers could include some steganography in their output. They might include an undetectable signal to indicate that this data is being replayed through a device, instead of recorded in the real world.

But then if someone wanted to commit a crime and get away with it, they could reverse engineer the signals from these projector/audio chips, and play those in the background. So any recorded videos could be discounted as a fake.

Also, I was thinking about how this could be used to prevent piracy when people record the screens in a movie theater. The studios could include a signal in the video, and the smartphone/video camera makers could stop recording when they detect that signal. But then a criminal could just hold up a screen with some copyrighted content, and everyone's phones and security cameras would stop recording.

If phones ever come with light-field cameras, it would also be a lot harder to fake. We'd have to invent realistic light-field projectors, but that would be pretty awesome. I've always wanted a holodeck.

This has been fun to think about. Would make some interesting Black Mirror episodes.

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#123

Post by pure-awesome »

Senderman wrote: post #112
JoblessWonder wrote: post #23

It all comes back to the original tip from a "Cameroonian source." Without that, they wouldn't have only had a ridgeline somewhere in (probably) Cameroon.

That's a good point. Makes me wonder if that 2D mountain range projection could be used to 'search' through a 3D map for a match.

Coincidentally, I had exactly just that thought about a week ago whilst I was staring out at a nearby mountain.

I have very little knowledge about this kind of problem, but to me, it seems like a solvable problem - there has been some interesting work in reconstructing 3D models from photographs of objects (I have a friend who did his masters in something similar) and I don't doubt that people working on that type of problem would likely have some ideas for approaching this one.

Though to make it tractable one would perhaps want to "weight" the algorithm / start the search from likely vantage points (i.e. from inside cities / on top of buildings, and along roads), and take some discrete samples of what the mountain range would look like at various angles from that point.

I wonder if it would be possible to do something similar to a binary search or Newton's method type thing where if you have two nearby points looking at the same mountain range, you could figure out the probability that the actual vantage point lies somewhere in the vague area between those points, and so get a better idea of where to take more precise samples after you've started with a few discrete samples.

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#124

Post by pure-awesome »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #53
eveningcoffee wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes it does matter. Tremendously. For example is this soldiers initiative or part of a general tactics encouraged by the higher command? Was the execution justified (i.e. motivated, that is, it was not a cover up or a random killing)? I can come up with few reasons to kill the woman but why the child? Is there some message behind this killing? Naturally these questions do not matter for despising such behaviour but a…

I will agree with you there. I always believe that understanding is important. There are those who think "Understanding==Condoning", which I find a tremendously, and needlessly, false equivalency. I think you need to understand, to trully fight and hopefully defeat something. How far does the atrocity go? What are the causes? Is this a one-of or repeated act? Who all is involved? And, ultimately, What are the inflect…

I'm put in mind of the classic quote attributed to Aristotle:

"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it."

If you demonize and dehumanize your ideological opponents - and even true enemies - you won't be able to understand them well enough to effectively counter them.

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#125

Post by tim333 »

apo wrote: post #22

I can't imagine this kind of analysis carrying much weight in 3-5 years as advances in machine learning and image manipulation turn the notion of "seeing is believing" on its head. edit: Imagine running this process in reverse. Pick the culprit, time, and location. Then arrange the scene to exactly match the false accusation. Probably didn't happen here, but in a few years it won't be possible to know the difference.

Even if they get the image manipulation perfect there will be lots of other ways to double check. Like if the featured video was fake there'd quite likely be evidence that some of the people were elsewhere at the time, or victims still alive and so forth.

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#126

Post by [deleted] »

pjc50 wrote: post #116
funwie wrote: post #8

This is one example of routine acts committed by Cameroon’s military especially in the English-speaking regions. No reaction from international community. Instead, the west is asking Cameroon to investigate. They’re basically asking Cameroon govt to cover up its atrocities. Video clearly shows Cameroon military shooting at mother with children. Same as hundreds of other incidents. What’s there to investigate? Condemn…

Cameroon has not ratified the treaty joining it to the international criminal court. This puts it along with a very small number of other states where there isn't an international legal process for dealing with this kind of crime.

[deleted]

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#127

Post by pure-awesome »

vpark wrote: post #25
vmaini wrote: post #7

how long until AI can do all of this?

Interesting, vmaini. Do you mean identify the time/location/persons or kill innocent civilians?

It seems obvious to me that the intended interpretation of the comment is "identify the location" (which is something I immediately wondered about as well).

Though perhaps you were attempting to make a droll remark regarding the powerful nature of AI and its capacity to be used for both good and evil?

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#128

Post by arethuza »

Veen wrote: post #113
natalyarostova wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? It's worth pointing out. Just because some topic is emotionally heavy, doesn't mean other aspects of it can't or shouldn't be pointed out. It bothers me when someone may make a noteworthy point, and then someone else tries to make some inference on how they feel in general by compliment of what they didn't reference.

It bothers me because of a widespread and damaging tendency to focus on second order ethical issues rather than the main point. Instead of talking about what actually happened, people talk about how what happened is presented or the precise words that are chosen, how the same thing happened elsewhere in a way that attempts to make the speaker appear a hypocrite, or the identity of the person who presented it. This ha…

It's a bit like "Responding to Tone":

http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#129

Post by kpil »

danso wrote: post #58
mcguire wrote: post #54

A brilliant piece of work to place the location. On the other hand, this seems to be...below...the BBC: " The government statement makes clear that all these men enjoy the presumption of innocence, and that they will be given a fair trial. " " The two women killed outside Zelevet received no trial at all. " No presumption of innocence was extended to the children who died with them. "

Perhaps these short-enough-for-Twitter statements aren't ideal, because they can easily be construed as demanding retribution without due process. But the righteous indignation doesn't seem out of place. Not only are the killings themselves shocking, but the BBC alleges that the Cameroonian government was itself complicit in the cover-up by calling the viral video "fake news", and putting the burden of investigating…

I think even BBC is entitled to a certain amount of indignation after having watched a video where a lovely 9-year old girl is blindfolded and then shot.

Re: Anatomy of a Killing

#130

Post by arethuza »

ascorbic wrote: post #91
aidos wrote: post #17

Incredible bit of analysis and presentation. It's hard to watch this sort of footage for me now. Once upon a time when I was younger I could handle it, but with young children the same sort of age it really tears me apart. Though, I think people should be forced to confront it, because it's the only way it's ever going to improve.

Yes, this is one of the things that most surprised me about having kids. I know it sounds trite and insufferable to say "I didn't understand until I had children", but I have totally lost the ability to deal with seeing anything involving harm to children. It really came home to me a few years ago when I was watching the news and literally burst into tears when this image came on[1]. I'd never had anything like that…

Don't worry, it's not just you - I also react very strongly to images or descriptions like that. Pretty sure this only started when I had kids of my own.
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