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

Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

storymaps.arcgis.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 178 posts

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#91

Post by alextheparrot »

dvtrn wrote: post #73
ridaj wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaving it up to local voters makes it sound like it's ok for a police dept to misbehave, eg harass minorities or evade accountability, as long as the majority voters in that city/county are ok with it. I think that's a problem and that going to a couple levels in governance (state or federal) makes total sense given the systematic nature of some of the problems.

Leaving it up to local voters makes it sound like it's ok for a police dept to misbehave, eg harass minorities or evade accountability I apologize, but I don't quite get how you arrived at the conclusion you have, specifically this point. Help me out here?

Historically giving power to local politics in the United States has been (sometimes) used to discriminate against populations. This is effectively what the Jim Crow south was, legal but unequal.

This isn’t to say that federal policies don’t also have issues. If we think something is a right of all citizens (Such as to not be subject to abuse by the police), that only really takes hold if it is applied across the nation, which is federal.

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#92

Post by akira2501 »

davidf560 wrote: post #30
wombatmobile wrote: post #9

> The cameras are relatively simple to operate. They constantly record everything in front of them, but only save 30 seconds of video at a time. To record an entire incident, the officer must double press the “event” button in the center of the camera. So non-compliance is the default. And compliance failure is as easy as an incorrect double-press that fails to start recording. Is there even any feedback that the dou…

> Why not buffer 5 hours by default? Because then you end up with recordings of things that you shouldn't have, like the officer using the restroom or a victim who has asked not to be recorded. Also, several minutes of buffer fits nicely in RAM. 5 hours would require a lot more RAM (making devices more expensive and thus harder to get deployed) or would require it to be written to flash disk which introduces new tech…

> Because then you end up with recordings of things that you shouldn't have, like the officer using the restroom or a victim who has asked not to be recorded.

Then make the recordings encrypted, and ONLY let the DA have the key that decrypts them. This solves the lack of data problem, but it also prevents the police from using their own footage without authorization.

> Do the math sometime on what kind of bandwidth and storage capacity a large agency like NYPD, LAPD, Chicago PD, etc. would need to upload several hours worth of officer-recorded video each day.

You don't have to save full quality video indefinitely. After several days, remove all color from the video. After several more, reduce the frame rate. After several more, reduce the resolution. If you built your system carefully, you could save much more video than people tend to estimate.

Beyond that.. there is a statue of limitations. I expect the police to keep their body cam recordings for up to 90 days, beyond that, unless they're directly related to a case, they should be allowed to reclaim that storage.

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#93

Post by pasabagi »

noodlesUK wrote: post #36
backtoyoujim wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What we need is for them to have to carry personally paid malpractice insurance that is tied to their access to qualified immunity. And if their camera is off they lose their insurance policy. Then no more access to qualified immunity. Being police is a luxury not a right.

We don’t need to create a private insurance market for yet another part of American life. Other countries have real oversight bodies with teeth that build public trust. It’s important that justice is done in these cases of abuse, and it also needs to be seen to be done by the public, which builds trust in the institutions of state.

Do they? I'm only familiar with the IPCC in the UK, and they are basically worthless. Germany, for example, doesn't even have something like the IPCC. Are there any examples of working police oversight bodies?

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#94

Post by tristor »

bigbubba wrote: post #68
pdonis wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the FBI is meant to handle matters of state or local government corruption They have a certain amount of ability to do that if the state or local government is violating Federal law. But they do not have general oversight or police powers, since the Federal government as a whole does not. Nor is it supposed to.

Wouldn't local cops violating people's constitutional rights put them at odds with federal law?

Yes, and as a general rule when cases are brought they are under the auspices of a federal civil rights violation. These are very difficult cases to prosecute though, so I think the FBI overfocuses on lower hanging fruit unless there's a political motivation from the top to drive this.

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#96

Post by danbolt »

dvtrn wrote: post #73
ridaj wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaving it up to local voters makes it sound like it's ok for a police dept to misbehave, eg harass minorities or evade accountability, as long as the majority voters in that city/county are ok with it. I think that's a problem and that going to a couple levels in governance (state or federal) makes total sense given the systematic nature of some of the problems.

Leaving it up to local voters makes it sound like it's ok for a police dept to misbehave, eg harass minorities or evade accountability I apologize, but I don't quite get how you arrived at the conclusion you have, specifically this point. Help me out here?

I think the parent is suggesting akin to a Tyranny of the Majority with a locally elected police.

For example, if I live in a small town that where 80% of the people intent their C code with tabs and I use spaces, they could theoretically elect a police chief who espouses tabs-jingoism and treats spaces-programmers less fairly.

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#97

Post by Buttons840 »

davidf560 wrote: post #30
wombatmobile wrote: post #9

> The cameras are relatively simple to operate. They constantly record everything in front of them, but only save 30 seconds of video at a time. To record an entire incident, the officer must double press the “event” button in the center of the camera. So non-compliance is the default. And compliance failure is as easy as an incorrect double-press that fails to start recording. Is there even any feedback that the dou…

> Why not buffer 5 hours by default? Because then you end up with recordings of things that you shouldn't have, like the officer using the restroom or a victim who has asked not to be recorded. Also, several minutes of buffer fits nicely in RAM. 5 hours would require a lot more RAM (making devices more expensive and thus harder to get deployed) or would require it to be written to flash disk which introduces new tech…

> Do the math sometime on what kind of bandwidth and storage capacity a large agency like NYPD

40,000 officers (rounded up)

8 hours of full HD video can be stored in 10 gigs of storage

do this 365 days a year for every officer

S3 standard costs less than 3 cents per gigabyte to store per month

result: about 50 million dollars to store 8 hours of FHD video of every officer every day for a year

The NYPD anual budget is 5 billion dollars. Thus, storing all this video would cost about 1% of the budget. I've made generous roundings in favor of overestimating this cost, and in reality it would be much less.

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#98

Post by triceratops »

hvdfhbj wrote: post #80
ahoy wrote: post #3

The police in america generally have too much responsibility and consume too many of our resources. When you combine that with the privileged status that comes with law enforcement you get a real mess. The problem is, as in so many cases, fundamentally about power. Until police have less power (that is, less funding, fewer numbers, and a smaller scope of responsibilites), i fear these kinds of abuses are almost unavo…

Why is it that the same people who think that the solution to bad public schools is more funding also think that the solution to bad police departments is less funding? If the police are substandard it means we need to pay them more to get better quality applicants into the system. We also need a better funded prison/drug rehab system so that police don't have to waste their time dealing with the sort of habitual off…

Why is it that the same people who think the solution to bad public schools is more oversight and accountability, seem to oppose increased oversight and accountability for bad police departments?

There's no indication that funding is an actual problem that a lot of these "bad" departments face. Teachers regularly have to buy their own supplies for their classrooms. Have you ever heard of a cop needing pay out of their own pocket for ammo for their service weapon, gas for their patrol car, or batteries for their radios?

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#99

Post by davidf560 »

gruez wrote: post #52
davidf560 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why not buffer 5 hours by default? Because then you end up with recordings of things that you shouldn't have, like the officer using the restroom or a victim who has asked not to be recorded. Also, several minutes of buffer fits nicely in RAM. 5 hours would require a lot more RAM (making devices more expensive and thus harder to get deployed) or would require it to be written to flash disk which introduces new tech…

>Also, several minutes of buffer fits nicely in RAM. 5 hours would require a lot more RAM (making devices more expensive and thus harder to get deployed) or would require it to be written to flash disk which introduces new technical and legal issues. If you're concerned about writing potentially sensitive video to non-volatile storage, that can be solved via technical means. Just encrypt the video with an ephemeral k…

> If you're concerned about writing potentially sensitive video to non-volatile storage, that can be solved via technical means. Just encrypt the video with an ephemeral key kept in memory, then store the encrypted video on non-volatile storage. You get best of both worlds.

Once you've recorded that video it's subject to FOIA requests and rules of evidence and all kinds of things like that. If your recording only includes the past minute or 2, you can be reasonably sure it doesn't include something it shouldn't (such as a victim who asked not to be recorded from an hour ago). If hitting that button commits a 5 hour buffer, then you're going to have all kinds of stuff now "in the public record" that maybe shouldn't be there. But also you now have 5 hours of more or less useless video that you have to store and account for (which costs $).

> Mind showing your calculations? Keep in mind you don't have to store the videos in perpetuity. Limiting it to 180 days (with option to extend if the incident is being disputed) would suffice for most cases.

It's actually less about the storage and more about the bandwidth to transfer that data to the storage location. Though the cost of the storage itself can still be an issue even if you're only retaining it for 90-180 days.

There's a whole bunch of factors of course, but pick a reasonable bit rate (5-10 Mbps perhaps) for your recording and multiply it by the number of hours recorded per officer and the number of officers in an agency. Chicago PD has 12,000 police officers. I don't know how many of them work on a given day but let's say 10,000. Say each one records 5 hours per day based on the 5 hour buffer proposed here.

10,000 * 5 hours = 50,000 hours of footage per day

50,000 hours * 5 Mbps = 112.5 terabytes per day

112.5 terabytes uploaded in 24 hours = 10.4 Gbps

(you need to be able to upload a full day's recording within 24 hours or you'll never catch up)

Doing this quickly so hopefully my math isn't off but it's in line with what I remember. 10Gbps being uploaded 24/7 to the cloud. 20 petabytes stored at any moment if you're holding everything for 180 days.

Sure, you can attack some of these numbers (not every officer will have a recordable interaction every day etc.) but I hope it gets the point across.

Re: Lax oversight allows Chicago police to avoid turning on their body cams

#100

Post by ethbr0 »

pessimizer wrote: post #70
davidf560 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why not buffer 5 hours by default? Because then you end up with recordings of things that you shouldn't have, like the officer using the restroom or a victim who has asked not to be recorded. Also, several minutes of buffer fits nicely in RAM. 5 hours would require a lot more RAM (making devices more expensive and thus harder to get deployed) or would require it to be written to flash disk which introduces new tech…

> Additionally, recording 5 hours for each incident has one significant problem: every video that gets recorded has to be stored on device during the shift (not a big problem), but it also has to be offloaded and stored somewhere for archival.Additionally, recording 5 hours for each incident has one significant problem: every video that gets recorded has to be stored on device during the shift (not a big problem), bu…

Hypothetically, all footage from an officer, when they're on-shift, could be of interest. And it's probably fair to say that state / the public have a right to that information for some purposes.

In the interest of sanity, I think we can suspend recording for personal moments: - Bathroom - Medical - Break time (e.g. eating)

We can potentially switch to a lower-resolution / audio-only take for the vast majority of a shift. E.g. idling in a cruiser.

As someone else highlighted, what we absolutely want to record is: - Use of weapon (holster switch) - Conflict (volume trigger?) - Immediately preceding interval before camera turned off (presumably, will contain a request / rationale to disable)

Effectively, what we want to do is switch from a trigger-on to a trigger-off. Cops shouldn't have to even think about cameras. They should just work.

Post reply on HN