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ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

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Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#201

Post by ineedasername »

calvinmorrison wrote: post #121
xbar wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

80% of all stops and searches are unfounded. I would not want to live in a community so policed.

But ShotSpotter doesn't do stop and searches. If police are using this to justify searches, thats between the courts and police, not shotspotter

It markets itself as pinpointing gunshots and police use that as probable cause. Either they reveal something of their methodology so that courts can determine if police reliance on them is reasonable or police shouldn't be allowed to use them.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#202

Post by hermitdev »

telchior wrote: post #134
daenz wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't want to live in a community with 50,176 gunshot alerts either.

You're assuming the "gunshot alerts" are actually gunshots, though. As noted, the sensors will identify other sounds as gunshots, and the company won't reveal its methodology so... do you live in a neighborhood with 50k gunshots, or 5k gunshots and 45k backfiring cars / fireworks / loud songs with gunshot sound effects?

I don't know about the accuracy of these sensors or the statistics cited, but having lived in and around Chicago for over 20 years, including 2 years on the south side, there are a lot of shootings. Summers are especially bad. Most weekends have double digit body counts. I don't know how many gun shots I've heard in Chicago over the years, but I can tell you how many cars back firing I've heard: zero. I've also heard a ton of fireworks. Southside around the 4th of July? Looks and sounds like a warzone. At least it did down near Bronzeville when I lived there. And before you question my ability to discern a difference, I can. I grew up shooting rifles & shotguns and happened to have a vehicle that back fired with some regularity. Gun shits tend to have a sharper report, a back fire lasts longer, a bit "boomier".

And while I like the concept behind ShotSpotter, the company, it's methods and its data governance are... Shoddy. That's probably the most charitable I can put it from what I've read about them.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#203

Post by irishloop »

I live in a city where ShotSpotter is often used to detect gun violence and it seems, at least from local reporting, that it's often accurate in detecting gunfire and often finds victim(s) on the scene, often uncooperative with police.

In so far as I can tell, it seems to be doing its job, though I understand there are several institutions here which obviously are not trustworthy.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#204

Post by throwaway17_17 »

woodruffw wrote: post #192
remflight wrote: post #183

If they don’t reveal their methodology then how could this be used as evidence? Shouldn’t that lead to the entire case being thrown out if the police were alerted by this? Seems ridiculous to not allow the defense to see the methodology, even radar guns get that treatment.

> If they don’t reveal their methodology then how could this be used as evidence? It isn't used as evidence; it's used to manufacture pretext to justify collecting "real" evidence. SpotShotter is not an ignorant party: they understand that the service they sell to police departments is a pretextual laundromat for busting up whoever the police feel did the crime. That's the crux of this case: SpotShotter is being aske…

In my experience you are 100% correct. This is also the potential use case for non-warrant based Ring/Nest video and audio along with smart speaker collected audio. I’m also certain this company and those like it are consistently looking for opportunities to advertise and sell the parallel construction utility of their services.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#205

Post by halostatue »

shadowgovt wrote: post #166
SilasX wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question: what probability of finding a shooter is the “right” threshold to go in armed and expecting a shooter?

You'd have to ask London police, since they don't. So my Fermi estimate would be somewhere between US and UK rates.

Let’s tighten that up, some. Canadian police are armed with lethal weapons and need to go into active shooter situations less often than the U.S., which is a wildcard outlier of gun violence, second only to active war zones.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#206

Post by elil17 »

ALittleLight wrote: post #113
elil17 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn’t comment on motives, just on reality. That is where these systems are deployed.

It's worded in a way that implies racism. You could write "high crime areas" or "low socioeconomic status neighborhoods" or any of a dozen equally accurate terms. Instead, the author chose something vague (are they being placed in Jewish neighborhoods? Chinese neighborhoods? Indian? Hispanic?) And suggestive.

If something has a racist outcome then I don’t see how its “implied” to be racist. It is racist. They just didn’t say anything about whether it was intentional (which no one can know except people who decided where to put the systems).

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#207

Post by woodruffw »

nickysielicki wrote: post #130
alasdair_ wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine I made a magic "crime detection" box that called the police each time a crime was "detected". Now imagine all it did was randomly pick a number from 1 to 100 each day and if it were a 1 or a 2, it "detected" a crime, giving probable cause to police to search people near the box. Now imagine I almost exclusively put the boxes in areas where black people without a lot of money lived. You could see this would be…

I would have a problem with that, but I don’t think that’s what’s going on here. My gut feeling is that shotspotter mostly works and is mostly accurate, regardless of what Vice reported. I can imagine how I’d build such a system and I don’t think it would be very complicated. You don’t need any powerful signal processing or AI, this entire idea was feasible 20 years ago. And secondly, I think that if any technology i…

Your "gut feeling" does not comport with any evidence presented so far. Until SpotShotter is compelled to reveal their techniques and present them to the defense, as the defense is entitled under law, it's just a magic box that conveniently agrees with the police when they want it to.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#208

Post by tomcam »

nickysielicki wrote: post #33

I don’t understand the argument here. Suppose shotspotter is deeply flawed and often confuses fireworks and car backfires for gunshots, how could that have any impact on this case or the legality of it? I don’t see it as any different than if a police officer is out patrolling, hears a car backfire, and confuses it for a gunshot. If he then detains someone as a part of his investigation and discovers some other crime…

What perplexes me is that in the USA we have a constitutional right to face our accuser in court. But this is a piece of software.

> In one case, a 65-year-old grandfather was held in Cook County Jail for nearly a year at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic before his case was dismissed due to insufficient evidence.

I mean, WTF.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#209

Post by elil17 »

daenz wrote: post #117
elil17 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn’t comment on motives, just on reality. That is where these systems are deployed.

Another way of phrasing it is: these gunshot detection systems are deployed where the vast majority of gunshots occur.

Well the system wouldn’t really be a problem if it wasn’t faulty. It’s the false positives that are an issue. You could put it next to the house of the biggest gun nut in America and it still wouldn’t be a fair system because it just doesn’t work well.

Re: ShotSpotter requests to be held in contempt rather than disclose its methodology

#210

Post by ineedasername »

calvinmorrison wrote: post #194
public_defender wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that ShotSpotter may be profiting by giving police an excuse to search people when they would not otherwise have sufficient legal grounds.

Again sounds like the issue is between the police and the courts over what constitutes sufficient legal grounds.

An assessment of "sufficient" cannot be determined without understanding how the ShotSpotter system works. Therefore the argument is that police should not be able to use them as probable cause if they don't give some insight into how they work.

This is no different than other technologies. DNA testing wouldn't be admissible in legal actions either if the tests were essentially black boxes that couldn't be scrutinized.

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