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Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

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Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#221
post #131

I wonder what our founders would think about tools like Flock. From what I understand these systems are legal because there is no expectation of privacy in public. Therefore any time you go in public you cannot expect NOT to be tracked, photographed, and entered into a database (which may now outlive us). I think the argument comes from the 1st amendment. Weaponizing the Bill of Rights (BoR) for the government agains…

they prob be upset about the 13th 15th and 19th amendments too

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is, unless you're black of course. https://naacp.org/resources/criminal-justice-fact-sheet

We’re pretending our upper middle class SV bubble is reality. Poor and historically disadvantaged people don’t exist for the purposes of this conversation. /s

Travel through rural America sometime. The working class of America are fairly poor but still overwhelmingly support the police.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#223
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what? Under current jurisprudence collecting license plates images isn't illegal, because there's no expectation of privacy in public. They could post the information online if they wanted to and they'd be in the clear. It's fine to object to ANPR networks on the basis of "mass surveillance" or whatever, but screaming for people to be arrested without legal basis, just because you don't like what they're doing is…

I mean, stalking is very clearly illegal. The main issue is that we have a different set of laws that govern businesses and that govern private citizens. If I set up a camera in a local park and programmed it to zoom into children's faces and stream it directly to my computer, I am surely going to jail. But if I set up 100 cameras to do just that, baby, that's just business. It's almost paradoxical. The more evil I d…

Stalking is not illegal at all.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#224
post #213
post #47

Yes, they should be secured so they can only be accessed by law enforcement. But if your spouse/SO/sister/mother/girlfriend/whatever was assaulted while jogging in a park that had Flock cameras, and it allowed law enforcement to quickly identify, track, apprehend and charge the criminal, you'd absolutely be grateful for the technology. There's nothing worse than being told "we don't have any leads" when someone you c…

Ah yes, the good ol' appeal to fear. "Think of the childr--err, I mean poor defenseless woman!" No, I don't want these cameras. I don't care if they make law enforcement's job easier. They are an invasion of privacy and a part of the disgusting dragnet surveillance state. They need to go. A decade ago, I was attacked on a public sidewalk by three men, who roughed me up a bit and stole from me. The police were utterly…

Yea I've never been a fan of the whole "makes law enforcement's job easier" arguments.

As though personal rights/liberties are trumped by a cop needing to do paperwork or leave his desk.

Plus, when you follow this to its natural/extreme conclusion, the absolute easiest thing for law enforcement would be to arrest you for no reason at all.

The rationalization for this policy of course could simply be that probable cause is "inconvenient."

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We’re pretending our upper middle class SV bubble is reality. Poor and historically disadvantaged people don’t exist for the purposes of this conversation. /s

Travel through rural America sometime. The working class of America are fairly poor but still overwhelmingly support the police.

You know you don’t have to say it in so many words, “rural working class America” = poor white people. Of course they love the racist police (who used to catch slaves and enforce Jim Crow). And I say that as someone who grew up in rural America. I just happen to have read a few history books.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's pretty open in this video about how Flock is far from alone in this space, and he's just using them as an example because they're so popular and flagrantly abusive.

In what way this is an illustration of Flock's "flagrancy"? I'm seriously asking. I'm not a Flock supporter. My point is that cameras just as sensitive as the ones he shows here are deliberately public on the Internet.

It's the attitude and marketing. Maybe not "flagrant" but "ambitious," "aggressive," and "expansive." I don't know the name of any other public surveillance/camera company, but I've heard about Flock, and the same is probably true of any of my neighbors who are even the least bit tech-following. They are also ambitiously funded for growth and expansion and their outward press attitude is congruent.

Other camera companies would like to see steady year-over-year growth in camera sales. Flock would like to see the world blanketed in 24/7 surveillance.

They make themselves a lightning rod as a business strategy.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The police are usually pretty good at their jobs, within reason. It's almost always going to take them several minutes at least to respond to your call, but when they do manage to arrive on the scene they are usually pretty good about eliminating the threat and rendering first aid/etc. There are some infamous cases where this severely broke down, instances of cops not entering an active crime scene and instead seeing…

That is, unless you're black of course. https://naacp.org/resources/criminal-justice-fact-sheet

Cops can't win that game. If they patrol black neighborhoods they're accused of profiling and discrimination. If they don't, they're accused of cowardice and again, discrimination. The cold truth is there are racial discrepancies in American crime statistics which can't be hand-waved away as manifestations of police bias, but nobody wants to talk about that.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Travel through rural America sometime. The working class of America are fairly poor but still overwhelmingly support the police.

You know you don’t have to say it in so many words, “rural working class America” = poor white people. Of course they love the racist police (who used to catch slaves and enforce Jim Crow). And I say that as someone who grew up in rural America. I just happen to have read a few history books.

Half the people I work with in rural PA aren't white, you're just showing off your own racial bias with such an assumption. They still overwhelmingly support the police.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's pretty open in this video about how Flock is far from alone in this space, and he's just using them as an example because they're so popular and flagrantly abusive.

In what way this is an illustration of Flock's "flagrancy"? I'm seriously asking. I'm not a Flock supporter. My point is that cameras just as sensitive as the ones he shows here are deliberately public on the Internet.

His other two (much longer) videos go into those details. This one is more of a quick update.

Just to give you a sense of the kind of company we're dealing with, the CEO of Flock called the guy who made a Flock camera map an "antifa terrorist". He's unhinged.

Re: Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way this is an illustration of Flock's "flagrancy"? I'm seriously asking. I'm not a Flock supporter. My point is that cameras just as sensitive as the ones he shows here are deliberately public on the Internet.

It's the attitude and marketing. Maybe not "flagrant" but "ambitious," "aggressive," and "expansive." I don't know the name of any other public surveillance/camera company, but I've heard about Flock, and the same is probably true of any of my neighbors who are even the least bit tech-following. They are also ambitiously funded for growth and expansion and their outward press attitude is congruent. Other camera compa…

If Flock vanished off the Earth tomorrow I think we'd see exactly the same ALPR penetration. Municipalities aren't buying these things because Flock's so good at selling them; they're buying because the ALPR vendors have an extremely compelling pitch! Two of our neighboring municipalities have non-Flock ALPRs; I think you're going to see a lot of non-Flock ALPR penetration in progressive-leaning suburbs, for instance, because progressives are all het up about Flock.

(I helped get Flock cancelled in Oak Park, where I live, and before that led the passage of what I believe to be the most restrictive ALPR regs/ordinance package in the country. I'm not an ALPR booster.)

But I'm going to keep saying: my thing about this video is that he's describing mostly things that are true of all public IP cameras. There are zillions of those!

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