> Police Department signed an agreement with Amazon's home surveillance equipment company, Ring, in 2019 to gain special access to the company's Neighbors app
this is the most scary part.
Atlas of Surveillance
31–40 of 140 posts
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#32There is no surveillance tech anyone can invent that won't be used at home against the domestic populace. And I do mean against. Parallel construction has become just another tool in the arsenal of control.
The other side of that is that most of these surveillance technologies could potentially be used by the population against the police and public officials. For instance, protesters don't exactly wear body cameras, but they have been using cell phone cameras to document police violence. Many of the other technologies listed (license plate readers, facial recognition, etc..) could also be used, though it would be harde…
For those who are interested:
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#33It's really interesting to me that in Los Angeles, we have every technology except for "Gunshot Detection". Anyone know why? It seems like one of the less intrusive forms of surveillance. Isn't this the thing that turns a series of cameras in the direction of a very loud sound? Seems less harmful than specifically copying down every license plate that drives by an intersection, or every face that enters a building. (…
Here in Cincinnati they use a series of microphones to triangulate where the shot came from
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
We really need to start calling "parallel construction" what it is: willful, premeditated perjury.
Genuinely curious, in what context is it perjury? My understanding of parallel construction is: 1. Officer receives information $A through inadmissible means (which may be illegal, but not necessarily) 2. With information $A, officer is able to "prove" that a suspect perpetrated a given crime 3. Officer pieces together proof from possible unrelated, but admissible evidence - $B and $C, let's say. 4. And this is the p…
The problem is, that they lied about how they got te evidence.
Eg, they plant a hidden camera in your house, see you packing drugs and puting them in your car in your own garage, and driving away. Since they got the info that you had the drugs from illegally set cameras, they can't just stop and search your car, but they can "randomly" stop you for a traffic check, and just "randomly" have a drug sniffing dog present, which finds the drugs in your car.
If the judges let this go through, the police would use more illegal methods (illegal searches, etc.) to gather data, then just "randomly" detect crime, and then the state would win cases.... and we (the people) don't want that. That's why, if you prove, that they knew the drugs were there from an illegal source of information, everything derived from that illegal source should be dropped as a illegally obtained evidence, to disincentivise the use of illegal methods.
Basically, the officer saying they randomly stopped you, would be a lie (=perjury), because they stopped you due their illegal cameras.
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#35It's really interesting to me that in Los Angeles, we have every technology except for "Gunshot Detection". Anyone know why? It seems like one of the less intrusive forms of surveillance. Isn't this the thing that turns a series of cameras in the direction of a very loud sound? Seems less harmful than specifically copying down every license plate that drives by an intersection, or every face that enters a building. (…
From what I've read, by itself, it's not a great system. For example, you can shoot a gun somewhere else to distract officers, and some noises are misclassified as guns (teaching officers to ignore those alarms, making the system ineffective).
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. Officer receives information $A through inadmissible means (which may be illegal, but not necessarily) 2. With information $A, officer is able to "prove" that a suspect perpetrated a given crime 3. Knowing information $A, officer makes up bullshit showing that he reached $A solely from investigating leads from $B and $C. 4. $A is now admissible because the officer can show a link leading to $A from $B and $C, but…
Interesting...so it's kinda like clean-room reverse engineering, except that there's no mandate for the clean-room? I'd be interested to see what a clean-room-like proposal would look like for evidence collection. I.e. independent agencies that can't share evidence/information between them. Of course, then a 9/11 happens and there's lots of hand-wringing about how "we had all the data we needed, the agencies just wer…
I'm not sure that's a very helpful analogy.
In these cases, the notion that there is something to be reverse engineered was obtained by illegal means.
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Genuinely curious, in what context is it perjury? My understanding of parallel construction is: 1. Officer receives information $A through inadmissible means (which may be illegal, but not necessarily) 2. With information $A, officer is able to "prove" that a suspect perpetrated a given crime 3. Officer pieces together proof from possible unrelated, but admissible evidence - $B and $C, let's say. 4. And this is the p…
The problem is, that they lied about how they got te evidence. Eg, they plant a hidden camera in your house, see you packing drugs and puting them in your car in your own garage, and driving away. Since they got the info that you had the drugs from illegally set cameras, they can't just stop and search your car, but they can "randomly" stop you for a traffic check, and just "randomly" have a drug sniffing dog present…
Yes, but what if the cameras are not illegally placed, but in fact put there with a warrant. Then there is nothing illegal going on at all, but it would still be in LE interest to parallel how they know about the drugs, so that they can continue using the camera and maybe find out where the next shipment is going to be as well.
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Genuinely curious, in what context is it perjury? My understanding of parallel construction is: 1. Officer receives information $A through inadmissible means (which may be illegal, but not necessarily) 2. With information $A, officer is able to "prove" that a suspect perpetrated a given crime 3. Officer pieces together proof from possible unrelated, but admissible evidence - $B and $C, let's say. 4. And this is the p…
The problem is, that they lied about how they got te evidence. Eg, they plant a hidden camera in your house, see you packing drugs and puting them in your car in your own garage, and driving away. Since they got the info that you had the drugs from illegally set cameras, they can't just stop and search your car, but they can "randomly" stop you for a traffic check, and just "randomly" have a drug sniffing dog present…
It might be worth coming up with an example that doesn’t illustrate an end that may justify precisely the means you describe. In your hypothetical scenario, the system would be working as intended according to many people, because the drug dealer would have otherwise gotten away with illegal activity that those people perceive as harmful.
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
If the evidence they're hearing on the phone is not admissible, there's a good chance it's because they're listening through illegitimate means as well, hmm?
No, not necessarily. In the UK, for example, all phone intercept is always inadmissible. The main incentive for paralleling something is to protect the source, to maintain its effectiveness.
In the UK, they do not have the Fruit of the Poisonous Tree doctrine. Parallel Reconstruction is not needed to bypass admissibility constraints because those constraints don't exist in the first place.
Parallel Reconstruction is used to avoid scrutiny of the original source of evidence. Even when used to legitimate ends (and I have doubts how often it's used as such), there are fundamental problems with dodging accountability.
Re: Atlas of Surveillance
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Genuinely curious, in what context is it perjury? My understanding of parallel construction is: 1. Officer receives information $A through inadmissible means (which may be illegal, but not necessarily) 2. With information $A, officer is able to "prove" that a suspect perpetrated a given crime 3. Officer pieces together proof from possible unrelated, but admissible evidence - $B and $C, let's say. 4. And this is the p…
The problem is, that they lied about how they got te evidence. Eg, they plant a hidden camera in your house, see you packing drugs and puting them in your car in your own garage, and driving away. Since they got the info that you had the drugs from illegally set cameras, they can't just stop and search your car, but they can "randomly" stop you for a traffic check, and just "randomly" have a drug sniffing dog present…
This already happens. I once had a conversation with a Homeland Security officer at a backyard BBQ, and he said:
"When you see on the news that Police randomly stopped a car and discovered a huge cache of drugs... you don't actually think that's random, do you?"
TBH I had never thought about it before but now I recognize this pattern everywhere.