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LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

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Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#51

Post by kmacdough »

SoftTalker wrote: post #9
someperson wrote: post #8

Are there any privacy-first security camera provider where it's the city that manages data access and uses it purely for local law enforcement purposes?

Why would you trust the city more than Flock. One of the common claimed abuses of Flock data is city cops using it to stalk exes and crushes. The problem with Flock is not who owns the data, it's the potential for abuse.

The government is not a monolith. Being owned by the city doesn't have to mean the cops are in control. The municipality can determin by law exactly who operates the infrastructure, who has access to what, what process they must follow, and how that all will be monitored and enforced. "The government didn't handle this well, therefore they can't be trusted for anything like it again" is a misunderstanding of how governments are constructed and how power can be separated between legislatively mandated structures. Find the source of the abuse, then build a structure to check that abuse.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#52

Post by cliglot »

vablings wrote: post #40
logancbrown wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The large distribution of silo'ed law enforcement across the US is one of the driving reasons why it can be so hard to solve crimes (murder, vehicular theft, etc). Once any crime has the potential to cross state or even jurisdiction lines, dealing with the inner-bureaucracy of crossed enforcement agencies adds days to weeks to solving urgent crimes. A distributed system without consideration into how to coalesce the…

I would like to see some evidence of this demonstrated. I feel a large majority of high-profile cases that went unsolved for a long time most often hinged on incompetence or negligence rather than lack of information sharing. Also, once crime does cross state lines the local FBI gets involved and they have a lot more resources than a small-town police force

> often hinged on incompetence or negligence rather than lack of information sharing.

Or just technology. Almost every “50 year old cold case solved” I see is because advancements in DNA processing .

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#53

Post by stonogo »

SoftTalker wrote: post #9
someperson wrote: post #8

Are there any privacy-first security camera provider where it's the city that manages data access and uses it purely for local law enforcement purposes?

Why would you trust the city more than Flock. One of the common claimed abuses of Flock data is city cops using it to stalk exes and crushes. The problem with Flock is not who owns the data, it's the potential for abuse.

And another common claimed abuse of Flock data is cops using it to stalk people in other cities, other states, and across the country.

The potential for abuse rises with the number of people who have access to that data, regardless of who they work for. Restricting access strictly to users in the municipality under contract reduces the number of people with access and thereby mitigates some abuse vectors.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#54

Post by inahga »

ajmurmann wrote: post #45
SoftTalker wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you trust the city more than Flock. One of the common claimed abuses of Flock data is city cops using it to stalk exes and crushes. The problem with Flock is not who owns the data, it's the potential for abuse.

I wonder why we aren't addressing the real problem which seems to be cops behaving completely unethically. Their job is about enforcing the system that codifies our societies agreed up and codified rules of ethics. They should be obsessed with this the same way people here obsess over system performance, correctness, etc! If we cannot trust them with the very basics of ethical behavior they are absolutely in the wron…

If you hold police accountable, they respond by refusing to work. That's a problem that, at this time, has no solution.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#55

Post by annoyingnoob »

hightrix wrote: post #33
bko wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, I'd prefer cops have access to technology that helps them apprehend criminals and enforce the law. Better audits and accountability are the solution, not removing technology.

I do know. I do not want to live in a society that is under 24/7 surveillance. Of course, if the cops can watch everything you do all the time, there will be less crime. But that is not a sacrifice I’m willing to make.

> if the cops can watch everything you do all the time, there will be less crime

I disagree there. If cops watch us at all times then more crimes will be prosecuted, think they'll just sit bored with nothing happening? They will find things, real or not.

The reality is that crime is way down, we do not need more enforcement. Leave us alone already. https://www.opencrime.us/years

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#56

Post by cliglot »

inahga wrote: post #54
ajmurmann wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why we aren't addressing the real problem which seems to be cops behaving completely unethically. Their job is about enforcing the system that codifies our societies agreed up and codified rules of ethics. They should be obsessed with this the same way people here obsess over system performance, correctness, etc! If we cannot trust them with the very basics of ethical behavior they are absolutely in the wron…

If you hold police accountable, they respond by refusing to work. That's a problem that, at this time, has no solution.

The government has had no qualms in the past using the army or national guard to break strikes.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#57

Post by kmacdough »

ajmurmann wrote: post #45
SoftTalker wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you trust the city more than Flock. One of the common claimed abuses of Flock data is city cops using it to stalk exes and crushes. The problem with Flock is not who owns the data, it's the potential for abuse.

I wonder why we aren't addressing the real problem which seems to be cops behaving completely unethically. Their job is about enforcing the system that codifies our societies agreed up and codified rules of ethics. They should be obsessed with this the same way people here obsess over system performance, correctness, etc! If we cannot trust them with the very basics of ethical behavior they are absolutely in the wron…

The problem is simple: qualified immunity has become a blank check. The officer can simply claim they didn't know the law. They somehow can't be expected to understand basic constitutional protections.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#58

Post by JumpCrisscross »

jchw wrote: post #44
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would you trust the city more than Flock Nationally, I trust a system where the data are split up between siloes more than a single, privately-owned database.

Do we genuinely, really need a mass surveillance network? Isn't the expansion of surveillance through increasing prevalence of technology already way too much? Police can real-time track almost anyone if they have a warrant as it is, thanks to the magic of modern cell phones. We didn't even have time to discuss whether that was a good status quo before it became normal. Are we really sure we want to expand this to a…

> Do we genuinely, really need a mass surveillance network?

I think that's a fair question for each local jurisdiction to make on its own.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#60

Post by thaumaturgy »

someperson wrote: post #8

Are there any privacy-first security camera provider where it's the city that manages data access and uses it purely for local law enforcement purposes?

Salem, Oregon, assembled its own using OpenALPR and an on-prem server. There are plenty of reasonable criticisms of that approach too, but it's currently the farthest thing from Flock on the municipal mass-surveillance tech scale bar that I'm aware of.
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