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Why Plainclothes Police Had Striped Reflective Tape on Their Glocks
- millzlane 6y agoSaved you a click: It's to prevent friendly fire during a shootout.
- aeoleonn 6y agoThat's what I figured-- it's fairly obvious: "why would unrecognizable cops have a symbol on their weapon?" "Gee, maybe so other cops know they're cops?". Why this is news or on hackernews is beyond me though.
- jjulius 6y ago>That's what I figured-- it's fairly obvious: "why would unrecognizable cops have a symbol on their weapon?" "Gee, maybe so other cops know they're cops?". What's obvious to some is not always obvious to others. >Why this is news or on hackernews is beyond me though. TheDrive isn't so much a news website as it is a magazine. This article is more informative than anything, and going back to my previous remark, it educates those who might not've thought about this sort of thing before. As to why it's on HN, same reason; not everybody would assume as much.
- varjag 6y agoCome on, the whole article is mostly rephrasing of the same statement interspersed with tweetquotes. Written to meet word count quota.
- jjulius 6y ago>Come on... ... what? I haven't commented on the quality of the article at all. Perhaps your confusion lies in my saying, "This article is more informative than anything...", but that was just me saying that the article was written as an informative piece, not a piece of news, because TheDrive is a magazine and not necessarily a news outlet.
- andyjohnson0 6y agoFwiw it wasn't obvious to me until I read the article. I know nothing at all about guns. So I learned something.
- jjoonathan 6y agoI know about digital IFF but I had never given much thought to "old school analog" IFF. I sort of assumed that uniforms were the primary mechanism, but obviously they can be spoofed, and with "tacticool" fashion as prevalent as it is they can be trivially spoofed. I never gave it enough thought to think up or chase down the actual solution. "They hand out gun stickers" is a delightfully simple and practical answer. This is the best bit of trivia I've learned all day.
- hsbauauvhabzb 6y agoNot really. If you can spoof a uniform you can spoof a sticker. And given it’s not a reliable negative identifier, it’s probably not a huge help anyway.
- jjoonathan 6y agoYou can't spoof a sticker you don't know about, because they handed it out that day. It's a shared secret.
- hsbauauvhabzb 6y agoCool, fta just said some had stickers and some didn’t. Now you’re just adding confusion into the mix.
- Animats 6y agoIn the 1980s, the NYPD used elastic headbands. There was a color or pattern for the day, and plainclothes cops were issued the proper headband at the station. I wonder what they're using now, headbands being so over.
- jsheard 6y agoThey use armbands now: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nypd-arm-bands/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nypd-arm-bands/
- zaphirplane 6y agoIt could be to keep track of the official weapon, which would imply they have another one with questionable purpose
- mikestew 6y agoThe only thing "obvious" is that your hypothesis coincidentally lined up with the actual reason...this time.
- dafoex 6y agoI guessed this before clicking, but its still interesting to know it exists. My next question is are they like invasion stripes on an aeroplane - i.e. they are changed before an operation so the enemy can't copy them - or are they coded depending on factors like rank or specific training, like the shapes on UK police cars?
- gnabgib 6y agos/It's/It might be/ While the article implies it has the answer (including with the title).. it's clear they're speculating and don't have the answer. A quote from someone who is qualified to speculate: "is not a totally uncommon practice"
- onlyrealcuzzo 6y agoWait. How does one have time to see a small piece of tape on a gun before making a decision to shoot someone with a gun pointed at you?
- peteradio 6y agoThere are a lot more common scenarios than the "split second don't shoot reaction" scene from every movie ever. From the videos I've seen a lot of officers were co-mingling with the "protesters", it would be nice to ID someone easily who *isn't* pointing a gun at you but who also has a gun.
- TaylorAlexander 6y agoThey don’t. But if you see someone else with a gun before they see you, it might give some idea as to who they are.
- evgen 6y agoIt is so you can flash the side of your gun at someone else in a dark/smoky/obscured room and they can see the signal, but you don't need to completely surrender situational initiative. The tape is reflective to help in this case. The person flashing the sign knows it is not 100% certain to work, but it better than metallic crickets or pass phrases.
- masklinn 6y agoHabit. They're trained to take in the scene in order to e.g. evaluate if they have a safe shot. Even if it only works some of the time, every time it works is a gain.
- matt-attack 6y agoIs it better to not even have a chance to work? Not sure why the choice has to be between a 100% effective solution and a "better than nothing" solution. It's like saying to the Fire Extinguisher salesman, "But what if the fire is too big and I run out of propellant? No thanks I'm not going to own one."
- jstarfish 6y ago
- stareatgoats 6y agoYea thanks, and now any and all potential misdeeders will attach it to their Glocks ...
- snowwrestler 6y agoObviously they will change the tape now that this version has been burned.
- overscore 6y agoIf it's anything like military colour codes, they'd be swapped regularly as a matter of course.
- snowwrestler 6y agoI have no idea how often they swap, but generally speaking, Federal agents unholster their weapons in public very rarely. So, there is probably not as much need for frequent rotation compared to the military.
- overscore 6y agoThey may have a "colour of the day" and routinely swap them. Hard to know how they're affixed, though - they don't look very swappable.
- irscott 6y agoCould be something as simple as hook and loop tape. One side is permanently/semi-permanently affixed to the slide the other side gets swapped based on x criteria. That's how I'd do it. The military loves velcro.
- overscore 6y agoTrue, but the photos don't seem to show the depth that hook-and-loop would add. That, and even the milimetre that hook-and-loop would add could impede draw and reholstering. I was in a non-US military and we used electrical tape - two or three strips around rifle magazines.
- Nbox9 6y agoThis seems highly counterfeitable, not to mention a hostile person in plainclothes could pick up a gun marked as friendly from a dead security agent. This tactic would best be against a force that doesn’t know about it, or an organized force.
- xnx 6y agoSo, sounds like it's better than not having the tape?
- ianhawes 6y agoIt's a part of defense in depth. It's not the sole marker of good vs. bad, but it's a way to minimize friendly fire incidents. Notably, the US Secret Service uses a method of "color of the day" lapel pins and spends millions acquiring them from a specialized manufacturer. The newer models have RFID tags and IR embedded. Could someone dress up in a suit and pretend to be an agent? Sure. Could he grab one from a dead agent? Possibly. But now you're making the objective harder for an attacker and tilting the odds in your favor.
- ghostpepper 6y agoHow does RFID and/or IR help in the middle of a shootout?
- 0x138d5 6y agoIf the shootout is in a low-light situation, then IR-reflective items light up like xmas lights in NODs.
- sokoloff 6y agoIt doesn't hurt. There is no budget constraint to preclude it. It can help when overhead surveillance is providing intelligence via radio to agents on the ground or when night-vision gear is in use. Any epsilon of benefit is probably deemed worthwhile.
- ryanmercer 6y ago
- hprotagonist 6y ago"ok everyone, the drive noticed, time to rotate tape colors!"
- jsheard 6y agoVariants of that technique have been around for a long time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_of_the_day_(police) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_of_the_day_(police) It's less effective nowadays, during the BLM protests last year the daily codes were quickly identified and announced on social media
- NovemberWhiskey 6y agoSee also the IR flag patches that were used by ISAF forces in Afghanistan.
- dafoex 6y agoDo you have a source for that colour code leak? I don't disbelieve you, I'd just like to be able to read (and reference) the source.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- jetrink 6y ago> It is used to differentiate "non-combatants from combatants in a crowded situation," Is it typical to refer to friendly forces in a conflict as 'non-combatants'? I would describe any armed participant as a combatant, reflective tape or no.
- stonesweep 6y agoYes, a non-combatant is typically a medic or chaplain in a military role; as an example: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28596180/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28596180/ > Under the laws of armed conflict military medics are deemed non-combatants, and as such are subject to certain protections and limitations A medic could be an armed (holstered but within visible eyesight) non-combatant.
- dmurray 6y agoCarrying a gun in a war zone is plenty of evidence (way less than the US would usually require) to treat you as a combatant and I could have no sympathy for an armed medic who got shot.
- thesuitonym 6y agoUS forces are not welcome in the majority of the world, I wouldn't fault a medic wearing a US uniform for wanting to be armed. But I'm with you that keeping it in plain sight is not a great idea.
- Giorgi 6y agoSo, all you need is a tape to blend in?
- Jackim 6y agoThis is one of several levels of security that law enforcement uses. These markings would also be changed quite often—having the wrong colour would make you stand out immediately.
- lightgreen 6y agoYep, tape of specific color/pattern used the day you plan your attack.
- Ancapistani 6y agoIt’s far more likely to be a “unit designator” than “friend or foe”. For one thing, they’re unlikely to be regularly changing out the tape on their pistols. It’s also very possible that in an actual conflict weapons could be picked up by the other side. This is more for “Oh, that guy is dressed like a fed and his gun has red and white striped tape on it. He’s DSS (Diplomatic Security Service). I’m Capitol Police, so he’s probably not going to hear me if I call for his attention over our internal channel. Better transmit on the shared channel instead.”
- djtriptych 6y agoMakes sense BUT why not tape on both sides? I think none of them did. Still that's the most plausible answer. Only other thing I could think of was that they might help when reviewing video evidence later.
- rozab 6y agoThe guy in the middle of the most famous picture seems to have tape on both sides. I think the other guys don't have tape at all, possibly because they're from a different branch.
- slowhand09 6y agoYeah, Mr Lefthanded appears to be sweeping his LEO friends with his barrel also.
- 17762021 6y agoHer name was Ashli Babbit
- SoSoRoCoCo 6y agoBasically, Sashimono. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sashimono https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sashimono
- cosmiccatnap 6y agoThere should be no such thing as "plain clothed police" Thats either an officer off duty or someone who should have no recourse for getting shot.