Radio show on surveillance in America
Link, MP3 Link (Thanks, So-Called Austin Mayor)Chicago Public Radio's Worldview program dedicated a full hour to the US's slide towards Orwellian "Total Surveillance."
Host Jerome McDonnell interviewed Lawrence Wright -- Author, The Looming Tower and Staff Writer for 'The New Yorker' -- about the Director of National Intelligence's proposal to expand government surveillance Americans' use of the internet.
McDonnel also discussed Cyber-Privacy vs. Electronic Security with Marc Rotenberg, the Executive Director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center
And McDonnel reviewed the New FISA Bill with Helen Fessenden, the editor for the beltway newspaper, 'The Hill,' and author of the article, 'DoJ, ACLU Cool to Specter's FISA Deal.'
It's a comprehensive overview of the state of Big Brother today.
(Image: Close up of surveillance, a Creative Commons Attribution licensed photo from Smith's Flickr stream)
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If 1984 had been written about a Big Brother that used this sort of technology to help fight a rebel group which threatened the Post Scarcity, Utopian society, we might think that Big Brother was a good thing. Personally, I have nothing to hide while I'm in public. I just figure I'm always being watched and that I should act accordingly. Just watching people litter makes me wish we were all being watched. "A watched society is a polite society."
Perhaps laws should be implemented requiring that all computers come with camera's that cannot be turned off.
@#2:
And all desks should have a memory hole!
++Good!
As a follow up to this radio program, you're really going to want to listen to "No Place to Hide" which was carried by National Public Radio a couple years ago:
http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/noplacetohide/
Cory, you're living in what must be the most "ultra-surveillanced" country on the planet. How does it make you feel? Do you feel put upon by the CCTV installations?
How about an article from your own point of view - a North American living in the UK?
I'm sure that there are plenty of Londoners who feel much safer knowing criminals can be caught with the aid of this technology. Seriously, what is it that any of us would want to do in public that we don't want someone to see? Our culture is becoming MORE connected, not less. Public privacy, if it was ever a reality, is a thing of the past.
Jeff:"Seriously, what is it that any of us would want to do in public that we don't want someone to see? "
This "If you don't have anything to hide, why do you care?" argument is overused and completely ridiculous.
There are two huge flaws with this logic.
1. Not every person in authority is moral and just. For example, maybe I know the local sheriff is taking bribes. Of course, the new CCTV system in my town lets him track my every move and know exactly how I'm trying to gather evidence against him. Hmm, that doesn't sound good.
2. Surveillance systems are often implemented by incompetent people. Maybe my disgruntled ex-girlfriend knows a little bit about technology and gains access to the CCTV network through a poorly secured wireless connection. Now she can see everywhere I go and starts showing up unexpectedly and causing problems. Hmm, that doesn't sound so great either.
So, my point is obviously that this issue is much more complex than having something to hide or "something we don't want someone to see."
When you give the government excessive power, you are exposing yourself to that power being misused by corrupt officials or misappropriated by unauthorized individuals.
I am also tired of hearing the "If you don't have anything to hide, why do you care?" line. I'm in complete agreement with #8. The surveillance systems may be just machines and incorruptable, but the police and governments who run them certainly are not.
I heard a half-joke once that the KGB (and GRU) spent more than half their time spying on each other and maneuvering for political advantage / extortion / promotion, than any "real" spying / investigation. That's the primary problem of espionage and eavesdropping -- once the systems are built they're really easy to take advantage of for petty and personal reasons. Penn & Teller demonstrated this in an episode of Bullshit!, where people would rather watch the drama surrounding the sexy girl than keep an eye on the suspected terrorist.
And now to watch the "Utopia or Deuteranopia" episode of Æon Flux...
p.s. I too often wonder when reading BoingBoing how Cory lives with CCTV and ASBOs while in London.
p.p.s. Can I get a jacket studded with infrared LEDs to mask me in a glow of light; at least until my thermoptic camouflage arrives?
Yesterday, i walked into a sexshop to buy a big toy for my friend.
If the shop and street had been rigged with police surveillance CCTV cams, and watched by nozy kids, i don't think i would have walked in, or come out of there with that huge bag without a heavy hood over my head, making me look way badder than i already do.
Jeff, my friend Thomas was murdered on his doorstep in London two years ago. The culprits followed him out of the tube, where the traditional guard had been replaced by CCTVs. They were idiot kids who'd been on a multi-day crime spree. Eventually, they were caught (not by CCTV, mind you -- because they used Thomas's mobile phone).
Thomas is still dead.
CCTVs don't stop crime. They move it around.
Catching criminals isn't the same thing as stopping crime.
London's CCTV operators have been caught training them on bathroom windows to watch women showering.
London's CCTVs have been found to be ineffective in more than 80 percent of crimes in which they may have captured footage -- because they were misaimed, miscalibrated, broken, or because the video had been overwritten.
@#9:
Clearly the solution is to create AI and hook it up to all these CCTVs. A constant, incorruptible guard.
[Open the pod bay doors Hal!]
Heh.
Cory, what if your friend's killers had be found because of CCTV? What about the one killer that is found? This society is evolving with its technolgoy and can both will improve. Maybe with AI (which isn't asked to perform contratictory tasks, like HAL 900 was). I'm sorry for your lose, but in the modern world I don't see many alternatives, do you? So what's the difference if it's 10 million "gargoyles" walking about, recording everything that they see? It's still observation. And I don't have anything to hide. That's one of the reasons --I-- use my real name.
Jeff Minor
Jeff,
The one little kink with surveillance is that half the countries in the world would arrest you for bad hijab, not murder. Vast areas of our planet cane or stone people for offenses like "associating with a member of the opposite sex" or "having a western hairdo."
You're thinking about CCTV in Toronto or San Francisco. Think about it in Moscow, Kuala Lumpur and Lagos. Once the surveillance is in place, the regime can change overnight.
Even the sex toy example isn't frivolous. Sex toys are illegal in parts of the US. I don't know about you, but I sure as hell don't want to have to tell my cell mate that I was busted for buying the 'Jeff Stryker'.
is "I don't have anything to hide" equal to "I don't have anything to protect"?
That's a very complex question. Particularly before noon.
Antinous said, "The one little kink with surveillance is that half the countries in the world would arrest you.."
I'm only able to comment on places I know. I live in the USA and I don't fear CCTV. Earlier today, after posting on this topic, I told one my city coucil persons to think about having CCTV put in our city park. We have liability issues. Also, last year a child walked down to the beach to feed the ducks. It was a cool, gray day and this child snuck out of the house while her mother was napping. And they found the child later, on the beach dead. She had fallen into the lake and drown. Now, if we had some monitors and someone at city hall had been watching, maybe this child would have been saved. THAT would have been worth all the money and the "discomfort" of having CCTVs. I also want them at the park because there is a playground where children play. Seeing those CCTVs might dissuade anyone who would hurt one of those kids. This is the 21st century. We have to have a more transparent society, not less. IMHO.
well, clearly here what is needed is laws forbidding mothers from napping.
When I was in college I worked for one semester for Campus Security. My job on most nights was to sit in a chair and watch several CCTV monitors. You could control the cameras, pan, zoom in or out. It wasn't long before I was trying to spy on people, following certain students, trying to see if I could get it to zoom in on unshaded windows at night, etc. I also learned that pretty much every student that worked the same detail at Campus Security was doing the same thing.
There is no way for us to know who is watching at any time, nor any realistic way to ensure that only "honorable" people with good moral standing are doing the monitoring (cops take an oath, and yet there is still police corruption).
What if the government suddenly declared that "hidden weapons" were too much of a threat, and we had to walk around all day naked to ensure public safety?
Ethical issues aside, CCTV probably works about as well as TSA screening. Somebody has to watch it. That somebody has to have a brain. They have to pay attention to the grid instead of their sandwich. There are a lot of layers between a camera and a response. I can't even get a cop when I call 911. CCTV mostly exists to document things for trial at a later date.
now you're talking!
What was that short story about a society where everything was transparent from houses to cars?
So nothing "bad" could happen.
A.I.s are coming along, how about coupling those with the cameras and adding a gun?
It didn't work for Ripley. They came through the ceiling.
there's a thought for CinematicTitanic; do Aliens with Mexican accents
Ill Ich said, "There is no way for us to know who is watching at any time, nor any realistic way to ensure that only "honorable" people with good moral standing are doing the monitoring."
Then what's the point of trusting anyone? We can't know that technology will not be abused by stupid or wicked people. But we try to do our best to keep the most people safe. And CCTV is one way to --try-- and help. It's not perfect and can't be. Nothing is perfect, but we can try. Yes the Government can abuse its power, and so can you(if you have any power to abuse). The British TV show Prime Suspect finished its run with a nice little murder mystery where CCTV was used to solve to help solve the crime. So, are the liberal TV writers in GB part of the conspiracy to promote the use of CCTV? I highly doubt it, unless they have a good reason to do so.
BBC is government funded....
Wait, I have an idea. BBCCTV! Turn the CCTV feeds into network programming and let the citizenry do the monitoring. And I just solved the writers' strike.