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Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

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Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#381

Post by emodendroket »

furyg3 wrote: post #46

It's pretty clear to be that governments shouldn't be able to 'subcontract' their way out of the limits placed on them via the constitution. Thankfully the supreme court seems to agree here in two ways: 1) Just because a third party (Google in Chatrie case but Flock here) collects the data and the government requests it from them, doesn't mean that that isn't a 'search' which requires a warrant ("obtaining someone's…

I think there's a reason that they've pushed to get these things up all over the country in a very short amount of time. I feel like the more entrenched they are the less likely the Supreme Court is really going to find against them and tear up the business model, regardless of whether it would be logically consistent or not.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#382

Post by some_random »

cm2012 wrote: post #372

Fundamentally this is silly because Flock only tracks cars and not individual people. It doesn't do facial recognition surveillance. Society decided a long time ago that driving is a privilege that can be regulated in a variety of ways.

There is a societal consensus that driving is a privilege which can be restricted or revoked, not that you give up your rights by driving. In fact the opposite is true, the courts have found that drivers have fourth amendment rights for instance.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#383

Post by 15155 »

DrScientist wrote: post #345
EvanAnderson wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The quickest way to get dragnet surveillance banned would be for citizens to collaborate and create a massive publicly-available surveillance network.

It's legal to film publically - what's not necessarily legal is what you then do with that. There are already precedents - for example it's legal to film ICE agents in public spaces, it's not necessarily legal to use information to dox if that can be construed as harassment. Even if you crowd sourced the identification of somebody involved in a potentially criminal act, you can only share that with the police and not…

> it's not necessarily legal to use information to dox if that can be construed as harassment.

This is an incorrect understanding of the issue, these individuals are protected using a unique and unusual statute. In a mass broadcast scenario, without identifying their profession in context, there's arguably no crime here. There's certainly no crime to broadcast that you've seen their license plates with no association with their names (the statute doesn't cover that.)

> Even if you crowd sourced the identification of somebody involved in a potentially criminal act, you can only share that with the police and not the wider public.

What are you talking about? This is most certainly legally false in the United States. If you are incorrect about someone you might be found against for libel, but there's no crime here. This is basic First Amendment activity. Have you never watched the news or read a newspaper? Allegations are part and parcel.

These are also entirely the wrong analogies. Both of these are highly individualized scenarios that are not akin to Flock. "Public Flock" is more like a public traffic cam that anyone can view, and these already exist without issue.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#384

Post by tavavex »

cm2012 wrote: post #372

Fundamentally this is silly because Flock only tracks cars and not individual people. It doesn't do facial recognition surveillance. Society decided a long time ago that driving is a privilege that can be regulated in a variety of ways.

Tracking vehicles lets you strongly infer who's driving them. Individual people have already gotten into trouble over their vehicles being spotted by Flock. If it could not be used to track people, the technology would be almost useless. Just because driving is a privilege (it's more of a requirement in the US, but the US at large doesn't really understand coercion) doesn't let you do anything you can come up with to people possessing that privilege.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#385

Post by slibhb »

wat10000 wrote: post #375
slibhb wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great -- so fix those problems with legislation.

Right, and while we're at it, we can stop theft by having the thieves choose not to steal. If your approach is that we can fix abuses by having the abuser write down rules that say they're not allowed to abuse us, why limit it to public surveillance? Stick cameras in everybody's houses while we're at it. Think of all the horrible crimes that go on behind closed doors. Solve the privacy issues with legislation.

If red light cameras are incorrectly calibrated, that seems like something that could be challenged in court and changed.

> If your approach is that we can fix abuses by having the abuser write down rules that say they're not allowed to abuse us, why limit it to public surveillance? Stick cameras in everybody's houses while we're at it. Think of all the horrible crimes that go on behind closed doors. Solve the privacy issues with legislation.

People have a constitutional right to privacy in their own homes.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#387

Post by tavavex »

ghm2199 wrote: post #263

Perhaps its time that YC mentioned explicitly that if they are going to fund a company which holds specific PII data(i would include precise location history to start with) they would have to guarantee: 1. An erase-me feature if they gained over say some X unique/active users. 2. Disclose to their best legal abilities on warrants served in the countries that allow such disclosure. Allow for strong whistle blower prot…

Why would they do that? Venture capital isn't there to serve people like us or to protect any kind of common interest. There is only one thing they know - money.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#388

Post by isolay »

furyg3 wrote: post #46

It's pretty clear to be that governments shouldn't be able to 'subcontract' their way out of the limits placed on them via the constitution. Thankfully the supreme court seems to agree here in two ways: 1) Just because a third party (Google in Chatrie case but Flock here) collects the data and the government requests it from them, doesn't mean that that isn't a 'search' which requires a warrant ("obtaining someone's…

But who will enforce those decisions and what is the penalty for noncompliance?

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#389

Post by TFNA »

canelonesdeverd wrote: post #317

A bit concerning how some people in this thread will bend over backwards to defend mass surveillance. Not surprising given who owns the board, but still.

A lot of techies have lived in China and seen how that country has stronger social harmony than the West and is gradually outpacing it, so mass surveillance clearly isn't an obstacle to the general prosperity.

The problem with mass surveillance rollouts in the West is that they are incomplete: the cameras might go up, but not all infractions caught on camera are actually punished. Meanwhile, in China vandals and other disruptive people do get traced back to where they live and apprehended. I think that if such a vigorous policy were applied in other countries, even on a contrarian forum like this one you wouldn't see much opposition to the cameras.

Re: Flock Wants a Closely Surveilled World with No Exit

#390

Post by ryan_j_naughton »

pstuart wrote: post #336
apercu wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably selling data to CBP/DEA. I went through a combined military and police checkpoint a bit north of Rio Hondo last August and it was surreal.

It's for a good cause! This has enabled the DEA to keep all dangerous drugs out of the country and avoid any sort of drug abuse epidemics! Think of the children!

I'm guessing this was /s sarcasm given the "think of the children" reference. Just saying so in case others didn't get the reference and thought you were being sincere...
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