2 ms·

Who cares whether a judge issued the judgement? The fact is that most of the poor cannot take time off to travel to a courthouse at an appointed date and time,

by s_q_b 11y ago

Who cares whether a judge issued the judgement? The fact is that most of the poor cannot take time off to travel to a courthouse at an appointed date and time, thus those judgements are entered without any defense. It shouldn't come as a shock that the poorest citizens are the least likely to show up to a hearing where they will be forced to pay money. Even from a strictly legal perspective, detainment for a civil judgement based upon evidence from a massive domestic surveillance dragnet is very Constitutionally suspect. But to be totally honest, I don't care what legal mechanisms allow this. It is simply wrong.

jdmichal 11y ago
I'm not appreciative of your continued attempt to conflate very separate issues in order to attempt to prove some "this is bad" point. I'll reiterate: If you want to engage someone about unfair judgements against certain classes, I'm not that person. It's only relation to the situation at hand is that it is a source of copias pro fine warrants. > Even from a strictly legal perspective, detainment for a civil judgement based upon evidence from a massive domestic surveillance dragnet is very Constitutionally suspect. The enabling part of this on the officer's side is not a "massive domestic surveillance dragnet". It's OCR tied to a database query. It's automation of a search the officer could already perform, if he could type fast enough. As I've already stated, I agree with the EFF's position about the sharing of data back to Vigilant Solutions. Especially because sharing this data back is not necessary for the technology as used by the officers.
- s_q_b 11y ago
  I'm not interested in engaging in a legalistic argument without considering the societal implications. The enabling part of this on the officer's side is not a "massive domestic surveillance dragnet". How else would you describe a state wide system that automatically records the movement of the population and stores it in a database other than dragnet surveillance? And Texas is bigger than many nations. So yes, I would count that as massive. It's OCR tied to a database query. It's automation of a search the officer could already perform, if he could type fast enough. Yes, and that is a tremendously important difference. A computer can log and store every license plate in real time. A single officer cannot do that at scale. The courts have not caught up to this implication of computing technology. This is due to a failure to recognize that a change in quantity can be a change in quality. For example, the occasional overflight to check for drug operations is qualitatively different from surveilling a whole city with areostats and drones. Both involve observation of public areas and are thus currently Constitutional. But one is far more invasive. Your reductionist approach fails to consider any of the factors put forward. There is no conflation of issues. You are simply parroting back obsolete precedent, and refusing to acknowledge the implications of your argument.
  - jdmichal 11y ago
    I'll make this simple. Take a camera, have it run OCR, do a database lookup, alert on a positive result. None of those steps requires logging. Therefore the use of this technology to execute copias pro fine warrants is perpendicular to the data collection use of this technology. I don't agree that the use of the technology to service outstanding warrants is a bad thing. I do agree that the data collection portion of this technology is a bad thing. Not agreeing with you is not equivalent to refusal of anything, other than the refusal of agreeing with you.

by s_q_b 11y ago

jdmichal 11y ago

I'm not appreciative of your continued attempt to conflate very separate issues in order to attempt to prove some "this is bad" point. I'll reiterate: If you want to engage someone about unfair judgements against certain classes, I'm not that person. It's only relation to the situation at hand is that it is a source of copias pro fine warrants. > Even from a strictly legal perspective, detainment for a civil judgement based upon evidence from a massive domestic surveillance dragnet is very Constitutionally suspect. The enabling part of this on the officer's side is not a "massive domestic surveillance dragnet". It's OCR tied to a database query. It's automation of a search the officer could already perform, if he could type fast enough. As I've already stated, I agree with the EFF's position about the sharing of data back to Vigilant Solutions. Especially because sharing this data back is not necessary for the technology as used by the officers.

s_q_b 11y ago
I'm not interested in engaging in a legalistic argument without considering the societal implications. The enabling part of this on the officer's side is not a "massive domestic surveillance dragnet". How else would you describe a state wide system that automatically records the movement of the population and stores it in a database other than dragnet surveillance? And Texas is bigger than many nations. So yes, I would count that as massive. It's OCR tied to a database query. It's automation of a search the officer could already perform, if he could type fast enough. Yes, and that is a tremendously important difference. A computer can log and store every license plate in real time. A single officer cannot do that at scale. The courts have not caught up to this implication of computing technology. This is due to a failure to recognize that a change in quantity can be a change in quality. For example, the occasional overflight to check for drug operations is qualitatively different from surveilling a whole city with areostats and drones. Both involve observation of public areas and are thus currently Constitutional. But one is far more invasive. Your reductionist approach fails to consider any of the factors put forward. There is no conflation of issues. You are simply parroting back obsolete precedent, and refusing to acknowledge the implications of your argument.
- jdmichal 11y ago
  I'll make this simple. Take a camera, have it run OCR, do a database lookup, alert on a positive result. None of those steps requires logging. Therefore the use of this technology to execute copias pro fine warrants is perpendicular to the data collection use of this technology. I don't agree that the use of the technology to service outstanding warrants is a bad thing. I do agree that the data collection portion of this technology is a bad thing. Not agreeing with you is not equivalent to refusal of anything, other than the refusal of agreeing with you.