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Is anyone else concerned about the surveillance in the new BART trains? It looks like there are 7-9 small CCTV cameras in each car. This means that there is no

Is anyone else concerned about the surveillance in the new BART trains? It looks like there are 7-9 small CCTV cameras in each car. This means that there is nowhere inside the vehicle where you have private space to enter a password, or check your work email, or pull out a laptop to do some programming. For people who spend 60 minutes (or more) commuting, this is obnoxious. Also, this is another step toward pervasive surveillance in the public sphere. Default-on all-angles video recording normalizes what infrastructure operators (and their third-party contractors) are allowed to learn about you, your work, and your life.

BurningFrog 7y ago
It's a public space. I don't expect privacy, and I appreciate that criminals can't either. The password issue you raise has some merit though.
chrisseaton 7y ago
I think realistically that level of surveillance is going to be needed to keep people safe and accountable on public transport somewhere like the Bay Area where people are very vulnerable.
- scolby33 7y ago
  How are people in the Bay Area any more vulnerable than people anywhere else? I agree with the GP; this feels like oversurveillance and scares me.
  - chrisseaton 7y ago
    I mean people are vulnerable inside a sealed train carriage in a dense urban area with a lot of issues and crime. San Francisco is a leading low level crime location in the nation and there are assaults and robberies on the BART system. > For people who spend 60 minutes (or more) commuting, this is obnoxious. I’m sure it’s merely obnoxious for you - but it’s there for people more vulnerable than you who get assaulted.
  - subsaharancoder 7y ago
    Once you witness a robbery or an act of violence on one of those trains and it scares you silly, you'll quickly rethink the "over surveillance" stance..
ben_jones 7y ago
No, with the rising amount of increasingly brazen crime on Bart (I just saw a photo yesterday from a mutual acquaintance who has his face smashed in over a laptop bag) they need to add more deterrence in the form of better fare gates, increased police presence, and very obvious surveillance mechanisms. I value privacy but of the many places it should take precedence, public transit in a dangerous city isn’t one of them.
chrischen 7y ago
1) Unless you're going from end-to-end, you're unlikely to do a 60 minute commute on a BART 2) It turned out a lot of BART cameras were fake. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/Replacing-BART-s-fake-cameras-with-real-ones-13102017.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/Repl... 3) If they got rid of cameras you'd still not be able to use your computer during your commute because you'd almost certainly be robbed within the year if you were to use it every day on the BART for a year. In fact, even with cameras this will be true.
- luckydata 7y ago
  That's complete hogwash. It is very common to commute 60 minutes, for example looks like half the workforce at Salesforce lives in Fremont. In the morning the train fills up right at warm springs and gets empty at embarcadero. This legend that Bart is mostly for short rides is just that, a legend. Most people using Bart have pretty long commute from Concord, Dublin and Fremont into the city.
  - dang 7y ago
    It's great to provide correct information, but please don't call names in HN comments. This is in the site guidelines: When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html (Your comment would be fine without the first sentence.)
  - mktmkr 7y ago
    I don’t know if that is true or not but rider enter/exit flows are open data provided by BART in their web site, in case anyone wants to settle the debate. I will say that Warm Springs is one of the least-used stations so I somewhat doubt this story of full trains departing. It only has 4400 pax/day.
    - luckydata 7y ago
      at warm springs you get about 70% of the seats filled on an old style train and it's rapidly increasing week over week as more people start using it. At Fremont you have every single seat occupied and several people standing. By the time the train leaves Union City most cars are what you would consider at capacity. After that it gets more and more uncomfortable until the pressure is released at Embarcadero. I also don't believe Bart's stats, the incompetence of the people running it is so massive that everything they do is suspect in my eyes. An example: https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/BART-escalator-repairs-delayed-pigeon-14114828.php https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/BART-escalator-repairs-...
umeshunni 7y ago
Given that the San Francisco now has the highest crime rate in the country thanks to lax enforcement, this is a step in the right direction.. https://www.economist.com/united-states/2019/02/16/property-crime-rates-test-san-franciscans-values https://www.economist.com/united-states/2019/02/16/property-...
- jacques_chester 7y ago
  Cameras don't deter crime as effectively as uniformed patrols. And uniformed patrols aren't eventually going to drain into a massive pool of recordings that can be mined for your every movement.
hcnews 7y ago
You can get a privacy screen for the laptop.

BurningFrog 7y ago

It's a public space. I don't expect privacy, and I appreciate that criminals can't either. The password issue you raise has some merit though.

chrisseaton 7y ago

I think realistically that level of surveillance is going to be needed to keep people safe and accountable on public transport somewhere like the Bay Area where people are very vulnerable.

scolby33 7y ago
How are people in the Bay Area any more vulnerable than people anywhere else? I agree with the GP; this feels like oversurveillance and scares me.
- chrisseaton 7y ago
  I mean people are vulnerable inside a sealed train carriage in a dense urban area with a lot of issues and crime. San Francisco is a leading low level crime location in the nation and there are assaults and robberies on the BART system. > For people who spend 60 minutes (or more) commuting, this is obnoxious. I’m sure it’s merely obnoxious for you - but it’s there for people more vulnerable than you who get assaulted.
- subsaharancoder 7y ago
  Once you witness a robbery or an act of violence on one of those trains and it scares you silly, you'll quickly rethink the "over surveillance" stance..

ben_jones 7y ago

No, with the rising amount of increasingly brazen crime on Bart (I just saw a photo yesterday from a mutual acquaintance who has his face smashed in over a laptop bag) they need to add more deterrence in the form of better fare gates, increased police presence, and very obvious surveillance mechanisms. I value privacy but of the many places it should take precedence, public transit in a dangerous city isn’t one of them.

chrischen 7y ago

1) Unless you're going from end-to-end, you're unlikely to do a 60 minute commute on a BART 2) It turned out a lot of BART cameras were fake. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/Replacing-BART-s-fake-cameras-with-real-ones-13102017.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/Repl... 3) If they got rid of cameras you'd still not be able to use your computer during your commute because you'd almost certainly be robbed within the year if you were to use it every day on the BART for a year. In fact, even with cameras this will be true.

luckydata 7y ago
That's complete hogwash. It is very common to commute 60 minutes, for example looks like half the workforce at Salesforce lives in Fremont. In the morning the train fills up right at warm springs and gets empty at embarcadero. This legend that Bart is mostly for short rides is just that, a legend. Most people using Bart have pretty long commute from Concord, Dublin and Fremont into the city.
- dang 7y ago
  It's great to provide correct information, but please don't call names in HN comments. This is in the site guidelines: When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html (Your comment would be fine without the first sentence.)
- mktmkr 7y ago
  I don’t know if that is true or not but rider enter/exit flows are open data provided by BART in their web site, in case anyone wants to settle the debate. I will say that Warm Springs is one of the least-used stations so I somewhat doubt this story of full trains departing. It only has 4400 pax/day.
  - luckydata 7y ago
    at warm springs you get about 70% of the seats filled on an old style train and it's rapidly increasing week over week as more people start using it. At Fremont you have every single seat occupied and several people standing. By the time the train leaves Union City most cars are what you would consider at capacity. After that it gets more and more uncomfortable until the pressure is released at Embarcadero. I also don't believe Bart's stats, the incompetence of the people running it is so massive that everything they do is suspect in my eyes. An example: https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/BART-escalator-repairs-delayed-pigeon-14114828.php https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/BART-escalator-repairs-...

umeshunni 7y ago

Given that the San Francisco now has the highest crime rate in the country thanks to lax enforcement, this is a step in the right direction.. https://www.economist.com/united-states/2019/02/16/property-crime-rates-test-san-franciscans-values https://www.economist.com/united-states/2019/02/16/property-...

jacques_chester 7y ago
Cameras don't deter crime as effectively as uniformed patrols. And uniformed patrols aren't eventually going to drain into a massive pool of recordings that can be mined for your every movement.

hcnews 7y ago

You can get a privacy screen for the laptop.