Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 439 posts

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#241

Post by butlike »

bmau5 wrote: post #139
smalltorch wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it's kinda crazy you can't legally take them down even if they are banned/contract expires. IKE Skelton, a county commissioner took it into his own hands and they were pressing felony charges on him. Not sure what ended up happening. Basically flock wouldn't respond to take them down, he felt it was his duty to remove them, he brought them back to his office, and then the state hunted him down. Here is a podcast…

If Flock can put them up, can I/my city just decide to put signs or lasers in front of the cameras?

There's instagram stories of people riding around destroying them, so yes, it's possible.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#242

Post by ihumanable »

dude741 wrote: post #143

[flagged]

Why couldn't the police, who you pay taxes to, do their jobs? Apparently a sophisticated robbery ring was operating with a well understood MO in a predictable location and the police couldn't figure out how to use those facts to effect an arrest?

Instead of "protecting" one neighborhood by installing privately owned surveillance devices, seems like the police could have just sat there, waited for a BMW full of Tren de Araugua gangsters to show up and arrest them.

In what world is this the reasonable course of action that was arrived at with the police.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#243

Post by ibejoeb »

engineer_22 wrote: post #236
ibejoeb wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have the answer, but I wonder if they are considered a utility and operate on utility easements. Then we have to look at the county and state, too. On the other side, I've read they operate a considerable number of private installations, too. Even that is suspect, too, in that there is existing case law affirming that people have a reasonable expectation of privacy in "the whole of their public movements."

They’re not utility. But you don’t have to be a utility to construct in the right-of-way.

Good point. Then, if the contract lapses, who is responsible for that infrastructure? Does flock have to tear it down?

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#244

Post by baggy_trough »

ihumanable wrote: post #242
dude741 wrote: post #143

[flagged]

Why couldn't the police, who you pay taxes to, do their jobs? Apparently a sophisticated robbery ring was operating with a well understood MO in a predictable location and the police couldn't figure out how to use those facts to effect an arrest? Instead of "protecting" one neighborhood by installing privately owned surveillance devices, seems like the police could have just sat there, waited for a BMW full of Tren d…

The world of practical realties that the police can't be everywhere at once?

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#245

Post by Eextra953 »

etdznots wrote: post #96

The best part is that flock owns the cameras and the poles so even when the contract expires the cameras keep running and recording data that flock can sell to e.g. CHP, LASD, FBI, Palantir; and LAPD can just call them and access the data the flock scam was engineered to be resilient to political pressure by giving departments and jursidictions this fake exit ability while the data continues to be harvested, it is a…

If this is the case then people can pressure their representatives to make this against the law. The people have agency here.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#246

Post by SoftTalker »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #134
EthanHeilman wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because finding people that are 100% ethical is extremely difficult. Even if we are wildly optimistic and say 20% of the population is 100% ethical. You aren't likely to weed out unethical people, so you are hiring people, training them, and then firing them 4 out of 5 of them. There are many cases where an experienced but occasionally unethical worker is better than an unexperienced but ethical worker. When faced wi…

So revealed preferences of voters is that they just dont care that much about weeding out bad apples? From what it sounds like, it’s likely not on any sizable group’s top 10 priority list in LA.

It's not possible. Whether it's a city government, judges, cops, schoolteachers, or clergy... some number of people are unethical. Trying to pretend otherwise is a source of a lot of problems. The best way to avoid it is to make it impossible, i.e. in this case don't collect the camera data in the first place. Once it is collected, it will eventually be abused no matter who has control of it.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#247

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

smalltorch wrote: post #229
tptacek wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can definitely take the cameras down. We did, there was zero drama. On the other hand, it wouldn't be surprising if a single county commissioner got in trouble for just deciding by fiat to take civic infrastructure down himself. That's not a power county commissioners have. Was there a county board vote authorizing that action?

In this case, law enforcement selectively enforced local laws. So the commissioner exhausted his options. And flock didn't seem to be bothered by breaking the local laws and their action was inaction . So what else are you suppose to do? I think it's reasonable to decide that if no one is enforcing the new local law, that it may be the commissioners purview and authority to enforce after exhausting all his options. C…

> So what else are you suppose to do?

File a civil suit and get a court order for their removal.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#248

Post by mmmlinux »

etdznots wrote: post #96

The best part is that flock owns the cameras and the poles so even when the contract expires the cameras keep running and recording data that flock can sell to e.g. CHP, LASD, FBI, Palantir; and LAPD can just call them and access the data the flock scam was engineered to be resilient to political pressure by giving departments and jursidictions this fake exit ability while the data continues to be harvested, it is a…

What prevents another group from installing a sign directly in front of a flock camera.

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#249

Post by fluoridation »

llm_nerd wrote: post #233
dude741 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to believe it. It happens to be true, but whatever. I'm not affiliated with flock, but not every issue is black or white.

I don't believe it. I mean, you might, but the story is fantastical nonsense. Ignoring that the police "confirmed" suspects that they didn't catch, or that you claim the police would need a "court order" to look at cameras the HOA would own (and which require absolutely zero involvement of flock, with the enormous downsides that dystopian, busted company brings), or that you cited "manually going through footage" lik…

>This ridiculous tale that a flock camera was a magic no crime shield is simply nonsensical.

I was confused as well. I thought the next beat on the story after the camera was installed was going to be "and the next time the guys struck they were found within the day" or something, not "and the camera repelled the robbers somehow".

Re: LAPD lets contract with surveillance giant Flock expire

#250

Post by [deleted] »

stackskipton wrote: post #61
cliglot wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

They don't strike, they just respond really slowly, pretend they didn't see something or just take reports and barely solve anything. Since they are all unionized and replacing them is crazy slow and expensive, nothing happens.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN