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Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

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Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#91

Post by reducesuffering »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #86
nawgz wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a few questions about the relevance of this. > 1.2 guns per citizen After 1 gun, do guns truly become more dangerous? For someone opening a door, I don't think handgun vs AR vs shotgun is a very meaningful distinction - you're going to die if you get shot in the face > loaded up to the gills Isn't it true that one of the top arguments used against gun control that criminals will have the weapons anyways? There…

A small group of Americans actually own guns, maybe 20%. So yes, the average gun owner has more like 5 guns. As for entering the property, if there’s five people and one gun, that’s a lot different to five people and thirty guns.

Most of the SWATing issues are in states where households have 30-40% rates, many with as high as 55-65% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g...

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#92

Post by RationPhantoms »

SpeedilyDamage wrote: post #65
reducesuffering wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the rest of the world loaded up to the gills with weapons? There's 1.2 guns per citizen...

Switzerland is, yeah. No such issue there, however.

While true, the culture of guns in Switzerland is very different to the US.

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#94

Post by Semaphor »

acidburnNSA wrote: post #88

I love my on-prem ip cams, my on-prem server that does the YOLOv5 image recognition and long-term storage, my Home Assistant that triggers alerts and sends emails to my self-hosted e-mail server and blinks all my lights, my OpenVPN-on-the-openwrt router remote access technique, my self-hosted Seafile cloud, my self-hosted CalDAV/CardDAV calendar and contacts, my mopidy/snapcast whole-home audio with local MP3s, my on…

> But I don't recommend any of it to anyone who doesn't want to make a serious hobby about of it.

Just to expand, it’s a scale ;) It’s very easy to have a few lights, maybe some presence detection and motion sensors, and make some automation for those without venturing into hobby territory.

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#95

Post by SpeedilyDamage »

reducesuffering wrote: post #90
SpeedilyDamage wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland is, yeah. No such issue there, however.

Switzerland is about 1/5 the guns per capita. If you look at US state gun prevalence, it reliably correlates to the where higher numbers of police are killed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g...

Chicken/egg problem. Who escalated first?

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#96

Post by KennyBlanken »

reducesuffering wrote: post #48
Someone1234 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Swatting" isn't a significant problem in other parts of the world because the result is super boring: The police knock on the door, ask some questions, and then leave. It is only a problem in the US because the response itself is terrifying and often dangerous. Multiple people have died from "swatting" in the US[0]. "Swatting" should carry a jail term for sure. But police reform is a large component in solving the p…

Is the rest of the world loaded up to the gills with weapons? There's 1.2 guns per citizen...

You're suggesting that police officers would face a significant danger merely knocking on the door of a gun owner's home, which is silly. Just because someone has a gun doesn't mean they're going to unload on anyone knocking on their door, much less a uniformed police officer.

Also: 2/3rds of Americans don't own a gun, and only 44% even live in a house with a gun.

Ever notice that only in a very small number of cases does a "swatting" result in any danger to the officers, such as the homeowner shooting an officer? The number of times this has happened is in the single digits. Hint: that's because there's little danger to police responding to these sorts of calls.

In fact, there's very little danger to police officers in the US, period. They have a murder rate lower than the general population, because people know that cops don't give a shit about when you or I are murdered (nation-wide the clearance rate for homicides is abysmal, one of the lowest in the developed world) but if a cop is killed, the killer will be correctly identified, found, and arrested within hours.

Being a cop in the US doesn't even rank in the top ten in terms of deaths on the job. Retail workers and cab drivers have a far higher homicide-on-the-job rate;

Pre-COVID the #1 killer of police, overwhelmingly, was traffic collisions, suicide, and heart disease.

During/after COVID, the #1 killer, despite police getting first-in-line access to the vaccine, was/is COVID. Completely preventable.

The reason these "swattings" are so dangerous is because police show up expecting a dangerous situation, confrontation, even though it's incredibly rare.

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#97

Post by gnicholas »

jahewson wrote: post #53
gnicholas wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Attempted manslaughter is a federal crime? This doesn't sound right to me, as a (former) lawyer. I would think that special circumstances would be necessary for a homicide or attempted homicide to be a federal crime, which would explain why there might be a mandatory minimum.

Yes, 18 U.S. C. § 1113. The special circumstances can be as simple as breaking another Federal law while committing manslaughter. Of course the Feds would much rather stick to prosecuting crimes that don’t overlap state laws.

The section you cite appears to only apply to crimes committed "within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States", which is defined here [1]. By my reading, it does not include crimes committed inside of US states. It is limited to ships, areas outside of other countries, and various other places. Am I missing something?

Also, it doesn't require a 10 year sentence — it refers to "not more than seven years or fined under this title, or both.". [2] That literally means that no prison time is required. There is a cap on prison time, and it could be completely eliminated if a fine is given instead. Not exactly harsh treatment!

1: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/7#

2: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1113

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#98

Post by biggoodwolf »

Pxtl wrote: post #85
Someone1234 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Swatting" isn't a significant problem in other parts of the world because the result is super boring: The police knock on the door, ask some questions, and then leave. It is only a problem in the US because the response itself is terrifying and often dangerous. Multiple people have died from "swatting" in the US[0]. "Swatting" should carry a jail term for sure. But police reform is a large component in solving the p…

Keffals was swatted in Canada, and Canada has a far less extreme police and gun culture compared to the USA.

Far-less extreme? Why? Just because they loudly profess it?

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#99

Post by cortesoft »

hprotagonist wrote: post #62

https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/1116670170980859905 Tech enthusiasts: My entire house is smart. Tech workers: The only piece of technology in my house is a printer and I keep a gun next to it so I can shoot it if it makes a noise I don't recognize. The only modification i'd recommend is replacing the gun with something simpler, like a sledgehammer. Can't be too careful.

I don't know, I have been a professional software developer for 15 years, and my whole house is smart. The trade offs are worth it to me.

Re: Amazon Ring cameras used in nationwide ‘swatting’ spree, US Justice Dept. says

#100

Post by richbell »

hprotagonist wrote: post #62

https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/1116670170980859905 Tech enthusiasts: My entire house is smart. Tech workers: The only piece of technology in my house is a printer and I keep a gun next to it so I can shoot it if it makes a noise I don't recognize. The only modification i'd recommend is replacing the gun with something simpler, like a sledgehammer. Can't be too careful.

In a similar vein: https://xkcd.com/2030/
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