Category Archives: Research

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Trickle down surveillance

by Nathan Freed Wessler in Al Jazeera America

June 12, 2014

Flag as Venetian Blinds“This sort of invasive surveillance raises serious questions about whether our tax dollars are funding violations of the U.S. Constitution’s Fourth Amendment. At a minimum, police should be required to go to a neutral judge, demonstrate probable cause and get a warrant before using stingrays, but many law enforcement agencies are not doing that. Instead, they seek permission using “pen register” and “trap and trace” statutes, which are based on a low legal standard and are designed to allow collection only of limited information about the numbers a phone dials or the numbers of incoming calls. Other agencies may not be going to a judge at all, or they may be concealing stingray use even when they do seek a court order”…read more

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Oops! Drone Chaos.

The Catholic Church Proved the US Government Is Making Up Drone Rules On the Fly

Motherboard

May 20, 2014

The_Catholic_Church_Proved_the_US_Government_Is_Making_Up_Drone_Rules_On_the_Fly_Motherboard_-_2014-06-08_09.16.41“This is what happens when you try to regulate without making regulations. This is what happens when you are caught completely unprepared for a new popular technology that you, as a federal agency, may not like. You confuse the hell out of everyone, to the point where no one knows what the hell is going on…” read more

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An article that shows hope that communities can stop the use of drones, but also the dangers from police lack of policies and trustworthiness.

Seattle Dumps Drones Over Privacy Concerns, LAPD Takes Them

Justin King and The Antimedia.org

June 2, 2014

seattledroneThe Seattle Police Department purchased two drones for $82,000 with a federal grant, but after the public condemned their use and the outcry became deafening, the police department scrapped plans to ever use the aircraft. Thumbnail credit: komonews.com
The Los Angeles Police Department overlooked the controversial nature of the drones and accepted them as a gift from Seattle. LAPD has stated they are reviewing the situations in which they will allow drones to be used…read more

The Seattle Police Department purchased two drones for $82,000 with a federal grant, but after the public condemned their use and the outcry became deafening, the police department scrapped plans to ever use the aircraft. Thumbnail credit: komonews.com

The Los Angeles Police Department overlooked the controversial nature of the drones and accepted them as a gift from Seattle. LAPD has stated they are reviewing the situations in which they will allow drones to be used,

– See more at: http://theantimedia.org/seattle-dumps-drones-over-privacy-concerns-lapd-takes-them/#sthash.hIoaZTHs.dpuf

Seattle Dumps Drones over Privacy Concerns, LAPD Takes them – See more at: http://theantimedia.org/seattle-dumps-drones-over-privacy-concerns-lapd-takes-them/#sthash.hIoaZTHs.dpuf
Seattle Dumps Drones over Privacy Concerns, LAPD Takes them – See more at: http://theantimedia.org/seattle-dumps-drones-over-privacy-concerns-lapd-takes-them/#sthash.hIoaZTHs.dpuf
Seattle Dumps Drones over Privacy Concerns, LAPD Takes them – See more at: http://theantimedia.org/seattle-dumps-drones-over-privacy-concerns-lapd-takes-them/#sthash.hIoaZTHs.dpuf

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The “hope” of drones and street cameras is that they will lead to more arrests. In NYC they’re seeing that this isn’t the way out of our problems.

What’s So ‘Progressive’ About 1000 New Police?

Gotham Gazette

May 22, 2014

headlines-745584“Politicians in high crime communities…need to quit looking to the police to solve their communities’ problems. We cannot arrest our way out of gangs, drug abuse, and or even violent crime. It’s time to move beyond the failed policy of throwing more cops at the crime problem. To really produce long-term safety we need to support truly progressive programs that invest in the lives of young people in high crime areas, not in more police”…read more

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It’s more and more clear that local law enforcement drones and other police surveillance are likely to be tied into the national apparatus that has already undermined civil liberties protections through warrantless searches and the like.

Surveillance state: the NSA doesn’t stand alone

Boing Boing

May 21, 2014

prism-slide-crop-001The NSA is supposed to be America’s offshore spy agency, forbidden from spying on Americans. But as an important article by the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Nadia Kayyali points out, the FBI, DEA and other US agencies have closely integrated the NSA into their own efforts, using the NSA’s mass surveillance to gather intelligence on Americans…read more

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Why are we spending $$$ millions $$$ if they don’t even work that well???

Review of Studies on Surveillance Camera Effectiveness

from ACLU’s Privacy SOS

orangeline_camera4In recent years, video surveillance technology has become a huge presence in both the United Kingdom and the United States.  In the United States, following the September 11, 2001 attacks, governments have spent billions on surveillance cameras to prevent crime while privacy advocates have warned about the erosion of personal liberty.  Balancing these two competing interests – privacy and security – requires a careful analysis of how effective cameras are at reducing crime and at what cost, both financial and constitutional…read more

 

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Recent rule by FAA may explain why FBI is searching for St. Louis owner of crashed drone:

The FAA Now Says Flying a Drone in Most Major Cities Is Illegal

from Motherboard

May 2, 2014

The_FAA_Now_Says_Flying_a_Drone_in_Most_Major_Cities_Is_Illegal_Motherboard_-_2014-05-09_21.21.10The Federal Aviation Administration has essentially just suggested you can’t fly a drone anywhere remotely near a large airport for any reason without permission from an air traffic controller without risking a fine—a radical 180 degree shift from decades of nonenforcement…read more

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Need for Local Drone Restrictions

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Brief but compelling testimony before Berkeley City Council on why we need local restrictions on drones:

1) courts moving at “glacial” pace on new technologies

2) drones are military technology coming home–must be controlled

3) this is opportunity to turn around the  general lack of accountability and transparency in government

4) government surveillance is fundamentally different from private use of the same technology–“Google doesn’t own a prison and won’t knock down your door.”

Thanks to the Bill of Rights Defense Committee

 

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A recent push-back against the same kind of Intelligence Center now wanted by St. Louis Police:

Confronting a Mass Surveillance Hub in Oakland

National Lawyers Guild, San Francisco Bay Area Chapter

Stop The Spy Center“…the aggregation of data on communities of color will be used to justify the use of force and violence in those areas in the guise of of ‘creating safe communities.’” Groups that still suffer from police brutality and racial profiling now have more to fear from a surveillance hub geared to track each individual’s moves in the outside world…”  Read whole article