11 ms·

In reality, the police were likely violating his rights and doing some good old fashioned parallel construction. They had his prints from his products, knew who

In reality, the police were likely violating his rights and doing some good old fashioned parallel construction. They had his prints from his products, knew who he was already, waited until they watched him post a picture of cheese, then claimed it was only the picture that caused him to be caught. This is a clear change in police methods, enabled by tech, and an abuse of your constitutional rights if this was a U.S. citizen. But hey, it’s funny because the guy liked cheese.

tomcam 5y ago
Almost certainly true and seems to show a fairly deep understanding of police work in the real world. I am truly conflicted about these techniques.
BuildTheRobots 5y ago
If the photo in the article is the actual photo posted, then I'm most impressed. It seems out of focus in all the areas you'd expect to need detail to match fingerprints.
- Crosseye_Jack 5y ago
  976px x 549px is a standard size the BBC use for images to be displayed on desktop computers. 976px x 549px would be half a megapixel. The BBC most likely resized the image they obtained from the NCA down to that res and prob threw some jpeg compression on it just as a matter of course when publishing the image to the site. While the focus would play a huge part, an iPhones camera (ok the phones were Android Based, but the res of an iphones main camera hasn't changed since the iphone 6s, which is what 5 years old by now? So its not unfair to say the phone model could easily of had just as a camera with just as high MP) is 12MP. So right off the bat the image you are looking could easily have 24 times less pixels in it then the image posted to the system, and thats before you throw in compression that could easily smooth out the fine detail of a finger print. EDIT: The BQ Aquaris X2 (which seems like was one of the models used on the service) comes with a 12mp camera. Even if the phones camera was disabled so the person had to manually copy the picture to the phone inorder to share it just means the picture we see on the BBC site could easy be just a shitty compressed of the orig that was shared.
  - sorenjan 5y ago
    The full image is 2048x1152: https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/2048/cpsprodpb/F8F6/production/_118643736_cheese1.jpg https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/2048/cpsprodpb/F8F6/production... Anyway, it's still cropped, and in this other version from a different source you can clearly see part of his palm print, which the BBC references: https://www.merseyside.police.uk/SysSiteAssets/media/images/merseyside/news/may/stewart1.jpg https://www.merseyside.police.uk/SysSiteAssets/media/images/...
- periheli0n 5y ago
  Yep—there’s also tons of motion blur. Although this could perhaps be filtered out using deconvolution. Using the cheese label as ground truth to parameterise the deconv filter, this might just work.
wp381640 5y ago
Nope this is all from the compromise of Encrochat. There have been dozens of stories about the pseudonymous users of that service being linked back to real identities since the initial first large wave of arrests Sometimes you don’t need crazy parallel construction theories - just a simple criminal network cracked because the participants believed it to be secure
- simonh 5y ago
  Right, it seems like he was discussing criminal activity on Encrochat, posted his fingerprints in the picture, and the Police must have had his prints on file from previous incidents. No rights violations required, not that such rights would apply in the UK anyway but that's a different issue.
  - IshKebab 5y ago
    Except that the photo they've shown is clearly way too low quality to get fingerprints. Presumably they actually used his palm (the article sort of mentions it), and they have a really small pool of people that they suspected so they could just manually compare his palm with known palm prints. I think that's fine though.
    - avianlyric 5y ago
      I don’t know why you think the photo on the BBC is the original photo. It’s probably been re-compressed half a dozen times as it was passed between police to reporter to CMS to CDN.
      - asddubs 5y ago
        it's not compression blurry though, it's out of focus
        gus_massa 5y ago
        In this other source, the fingerprints of the thumb and the pinky are almost visible https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/may/liverpool-man-latest-to-be-jailed-as-part-of-national-operation-venetic/ https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/m... Anyway, the other fingers look too out of focus to detect anything.
weego 5y ago
A major dealer in Liverpool is almost certainly someone who has his prints on file for previous crimes. They'll have suspected that account was him for a while but didn't have reasonable grounds, this photo clearly convinced someone it gave them that. But sure, let's take talking points from another country and apply it here too to get angry because question mark
- axiosgunnar 5y ago
  Exactly, this „taking Us talking points and bruteforcing them onto other societies with a completely different legal system, history, and culture“ angers me a lot.
  - jan_Inkepa 5y ago
    > completely different legal system, history, and culture America's legal system, while divergent nowadays, owes a lot to the UK's and they have a substantially common history, and American lawyers + judges still cite (pre-independence) English cases and thinkers from time to time - 'The [US Supreme] Court’s references to Blackstone [english lawyer/politician/judge] have increased tenfold since the 1930s, so that the Commentaries is now cited in 1 in 13 cases. At the same time, practically nobody reads it. Indeed, part of Blackstone’s persuasive power today comes from his text’s simultaneous familiarity and mystery. The Court capitalizes on Blackstone’s status as a kind of mythical ancestor – the “oracle of the law in the mind of the American framers,” citing Blackstone for the original meaning of the Constitution. ' e.g. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2402231 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2402231 [ But yeah, US-centric projection can be wearying. ]
- StavrosK 5y ago
  Do you see any visible fingerprints on the photo? I don't.
  - bdowling 5y ago
    > Do you see any visible fingerprints on the photo? I don't. The photo accompanying the article has the fingers blurred out. In the original photo the fingers must have been clearly visible, because that’s how the police are claiming they identified the man.
PeterisP 5y ago
IMHO the concept of "parallel construction" is mostly an USA specific thing because USA legal doctrine is heavy on fourth amendment application and "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine that can make evidence inadmissible depending on how it was obtained. But all those things and rights are specific to USA, not in general, and not even for other common law countries. As far as I understand, such "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine is not applied in UK, as long as the evidence is believed to be true, it would generally be admissible in court even if it was obtained through e.g. mass warrantless wiretapping, so if they knew who he was already, they could and would have just gone ahead and there would be no need to put in the effort for some parallel construction.
- adolph 5y ago
  Parallel construction is also used to protect sources and methods.
  - adolph 5y ago
    The perverting the course of justice charge alleges the trio disclosed information that law enforcement could access encrypted EncroChat data. https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/news/operation-venetic-police-worker-among-three-charged https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/news/operation-veneti...
  - LatteLazy 5y ago
    In the UK, defense lawyers aren't allowed to reveal details if it harms future police operations. So again you don't need parallel construction.
    - pc86 5y ago
      Does this result in a lot of sealed/private hearings where methods of gathering evidence are discussed? I'd imagine the majority of criminal prosecutions would involve at least some "trade secrets" (for lack of a better term) on the part of the police.
gpderetta 5y ago
I don't think there is a fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine in UK. Of course there might be other reasons not to admit to illegally obtained evidence.
- faverin 5y ago
  There isn't. Until very recently (Human Rights Act) justice was deemed to have been served by bringing all evidence to the court. The ECHR gave some rights which now have to be balanced against justice but its still anything goes. There is some interesting court ruling on Azima Rakia hacking case too. Interestingly the courts are waiting for the case where computer hacking infringes on people's right to privacy... Rather than pretend i'll quote a leading case. Woman faked her hand palsy and was filmed illegally by the insurance agents...this is the appeal rulign (so important in uk legal terms) Jones v University of Warwick [2003] EWCA Civ 15 https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2003/151.html https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2003/151.html That leaves the issue as to how the court should exercise its discretion in the difficult situation confronting the district judge and Judge Harris. The court must try to give effect to what are here the two conflicting public interests. The weight to be attached to each will vary according to the circumstances. The significance of the evidence will differ as will the gravity of the breach of Article 8, according to the facts of the particular case. The decision will depend on all the circumstances. Here, the court cannot ignore the reality of the situation. This is not a case where the conduct of the defendant's insurers is so outrageous that the defence should be struck out. The case, therefore, has to be tried. It would be artificial and undesirable for the actual evidence, which is relevant and admissible, not to be placed before the judge who has the task of trying the case. We accept Mr Owen's submission that to exclude the use of the evidence would create a wholly undesirable situation. Fresh medical experts would have to be instructed on both sides. Evidence which is relevant would have to be concealed from them, perhaps resulting in a misdiagnosis; and it would not be possible to cross-examine the claimant appropriately. For these reasons we do not consider it would be right to interfere with the Judge's decision not to exclude the evidence. Mr Weir's submission that we should determine the issue on the basis of the facts as they were before the district judge is not realistic. Nonetheless, it is right that we should make clear that we do not accept that the criticism of the claimant's legal advisers for deciding not to reveal the contents of the video films in issue to their medical experts is justified. It was sensible to defer doing so until it was known whether the evidence could be used. While not excluding the evidence it is appropriate to make clear that the conduct of the insurers was improper and not justified. We disagree with the indication by Judge Harris to the contrary. The fact that the insurers may have been motivated by a desire to achieve what they considered would be a just result does not justify either the commission of trespass or the contravention of the claimant's privacy which took place. We come to this conclusion irrespective of whether Mr Weir is right in contending that in this particular case the evidence could be obtained by other means. Excluding the evidence is not, moreover, the only weapon in the court's armoury. The court has other steps it can take to discourage conduct of the type of which complaint is made. In particular it can reflect its disapproval in the orders for costs which it makes. In this appeal, we therefore propose, because the conduct of the insurers gave rise to the litigation over admissibility of the evidence which has followed upon their conduct, to order the defendants to pay the costs of these proceedings to resolve this issue before the district judge, Judge Harris and this court even though we otherwise dismiss the appeal. This is subject to Mr Owen having an opportunity to persuade us to do otherwise. In addition, we would indicate to the trial judge that when he comes to deal with the question of costs he should take into account the defendant's conduct which is the subject of this appeal when deciding the appropriate order for costs. He may consider the costs of the inquiry agent should not be recovered. If he concludes, as the complainant now contends, that there is an innocent explanation for what is shown as to the claimant's control of her movements then this is a matter which should be reflected in costs, perhaps by ordering the defendants to pay the costs throughout on an indemnity basis. In giving effect to the overriding objective, and taking into account the wider interests of the administration of justice, the court must while doing justice between the parties, also deter improper conduct of a party while conducting litigation. We do not pretend that this is a perfect reconciliation of the conflicting public interests. It is not; but at least the solution does not ignore the insurer's conduct.
bserge 5y ago
Similar to how companies "don't discriminate" when hiring or firing.
avianlyric 5y ago
I’m a little confused could you explain a little more detail why you think this is parallel construction? You’re probably right that they already knew who he was, and probably had some evidence that he was drug dealing, certainly enough to arrest him. But unequivocally proving he’s a dealer is still tricky, especially establishing intent. The image made it possible to tie the individuals real world identity to their “anonymous” identity, and thus associate it with clear intent to distribute drugs (presumably they also had his chat history). If the chat system he was using was compromised by police with a lawful warrant to compromise the service, then what right was violated? How is it different to police infiltrating online forums, or even just physical locations that dealers are know to spend time in?
asddubs 5y ago
yup, this is the first thing that sprung to my mind as well. yeah right, they analyzed his palm in a blurry photo. give me a break. they monitored him in some way that was illegal and then used this as the cover story
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
heywherelogingo 5y ago
The BBC is used to nudge people into behaving as preferred by higher-ups - it's a propaganda organisation. The police are basically government thugs - not law abiding where they can get away with it. So whether your interpretation is correct or not, I don't know, but you're right that this story is probably untrue.
hristov 5y ago
Why would it be a violation of his rights? The police have a right to investigate and they sure have a right to gather fingerprints from drugs.
- pbhjpbhj 5y ago
  Do they, for example, have a right to decrypt emails for the purposes of data mining? I'd have thought they needed a warrant and/or reasonable suspicion before they're allowed to just mine anyone and everyone's private communications. Are UK police, for example, allowed to run fingerprint and facial matching algos against all image-based content uploaded to Facebook/YouTube/Instagram/whatever? I thought dragnet policing was considered to infringe the right to a private and family life, say? In short the police right to investigate is curtailed, and controlled by the courts and a warrant process, at least.
Fnoord 5y ago
Not needed (Occam's Razor). EncroChat is a gold mine for the police, world wide. Being active there alone is suspicious, and it was effectively a honeypot. High quality picture containing a finger contains fingerprint. You run that through a database and presto.
dokem 5y ago
I'm not following, of course they would have to have his fingerprints also somewhere else.
reledi 5y ago
It's a plausible theory, but they almost definitely would have had prints from him already. The fingers and palm were analysed in the photo. There's a better photo here: https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/may/liverpool-man-latest-to-be-jailed-as-part-of-national-operation-venetic/ https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/m... Without any image processing, we can already see palm prints and the ridges and lines in the palm and fingers. These are unique biometric identifiers. In fact, palms have more identifying characteristics than fingerprints. They are almost certainly telling the truth in this story.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

tomcam 5y ago

Almost certainly true and seems to show a fairly deep understanding of police work in the real world. I am truly conflicted about these techniques.

BuildTheRobots 5y ago

If the photo in the article is the actual photo posted, then I'm most impressed. It seems out of focus in all the areas you'd expect to need detail to match fingerprints.

Crosseye_Jack 5y ago
976px x 549px is a standard size the BBC use for images to be displayed on desktop computers. 976px x 549px would be half a megapixel. The BBC most likely resized the image they obtained from the NCA down to that res and prob threw some jpeg compression on it just as a matter of course when publishing the image to the site. While the focus would play a huge part, an iPhones camera (ok the phones were Android Based, but the res of an iphones main camera hasn't changed since the iphone 6s, which is what 5 years old by now? So its not unfair to say the phone model could easily of had just as a camera with just as high MP) is 12MP. So right off the bat the image you are looking could easily have 24 times less pixels in it then the image posted to the system, and thats before you throw in compression that could easily smooth out the fine detail of a finger print. EDIT: The BQ Aquaris X2 (which seems like was one of the models used on the service) comes with a 12mp camera. Even if the phones camera was disabled so the person had to manually copy the picture to the phone inorder to share it just means the picture we see on the BBC site could easy be just a shitty compressed of the orig that was shared.
- sorenjan 5y ago
  The full image is 2048x1152: https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/2048/cpsprodpb/F8F6/production/_118643736_cheese1.jpg https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/2048/cpsprodpb/F8F6/production... Anyway, it's still cropped, and in this other version from a different source you can clearly see part of his palm print, which the BBC references: https://www.merseyside.police.uk/SysSiteAssets/media/images/merseyside/news/may/stewart1.jpg https://www.merseyside.police.uk/SysSiteAssets/media/images/...
periheli0n 5y ago
Yep—there’s also tons of motion blur. Although this could perhaps be filtered out using deconvolution. Using the cheese label as ground truth to parameterise the deconv filter, this might just work.

wp381640 5y ago

Nope this is all from the compromise of Encrochat. There have been dozens of stories about the pseudonymous users of that service being linked back to real identities since the initial first large wave of arrests Sometimes you don’t need crazy parallel construction theories - just a simple criminal network cracked because the participants believed it to be secure

simonh 5y ago
Right, it seems like he was discussing criminal activity on Encrochat, posted his fingerprints in the picture, and the Police must have had his prints on file from previous incidents. No rights violations required, not that such rights would apply in the UK anyway but that's a different issue.
- IshKebab 5y ago
  Except that the photo they've shown is clearly way too low quality to get fingerprints. Presumably they actually used his palm (the article sort of mentions it), and they have a really small pool of people that they suspected so they could just manually compare his palm with known palm prints. I think that's fine though.
  - avianlyric 5y ago
    I don’t know why you think the photo on the BBC is the original photo. It’s probably been re-compressed half a dozen times as it was passed between police to reporter to CMS to CDN.
    - asddubs 5y ago
      it's not compression blurry though, it's out of focus
      - gus_massa 5y ago
        In this other source, the fingerprints of the thumb and the pinky are almost visible https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/may/liverpool-man-latest-to-be-jailed-as-part-of-national-operation-venetic/ https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/m... Anyway, the other fingers look too out of focus to detect anything.

weego 5y ago

A major dealer in Liverpool is almost certainly someone who has his prints on file for previous crimes. They'll have suspected that account was him for a while but didn't have reasonable grounds, this photo clearly convinced someone it gave them that. But sure, let's take talking points from another country and apply it here too to get angry because question mark

axiosgunnar 5y ago
Exactly, this „taking Us talking points and bruteforcing them onto other societies with a completely different legal system, history, and culture“ angers me a lot.
- jan_Inkepa 5y ago
  > completely different legal system, history, and culture America's legal system, while divergent nowadays, owes a lot to the UK's and they have a substantially common history, and American lawyers + judges still cite (pre-independence) English cases and thinkers from time to time - 'The [US Supreme] Court’s references to Blackstone [english lawyer/politician/judge] have increased tenfold since the 1930s, so that the Commentaries is now cited in 1 in 13 cases. At the same time, practically nobody reads it. Indeed, part of Blackstone’s persuasive power today comes from his text’s simultaneous familiarity and mystery. The Court capitalizes on Blackstone’s status as a kind of mythical ancestor – the “oracle of the law in the mind of the American framers,” citing Blackstone for the original meaning of the Constitution. ' e.g. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2402231 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2402231 [ But yeah, US-centric projection can be wearying. ]
StavrosK 5y ago
Do you see any visible fingerprints on the photo? I don't.
- bdowling 5y ago
  > Do you see any visible fingerprints on the photo? I don't. The photo accompanying the article has the fingers blurred out. In the original photo the fingers must have been clearly visible, because that’s how the police are claiming they identified the man.

PeterisP 5y ago

IMHO the concept of "parallel construction" is mostly an USA specific thing because USA legal doctrine is heavy on fourth amendment application and "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine that can make evidence inadmissible depending on how it was obtained. But all those things and rights are specific to USA, not in general, and not even for other common law countries. As far as I understand, such "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine is not applied in UK, as long as the evidence is believed to be true, it would generally be admissible in court even if it was obtained through e.g. mass warrantless wiretapping, so if they knew who he was already, they could and would have just gone ahead and there would be no need to put in the effort for some parallel construction.

adolph 5y ago
Parallel construction is also used to protect sources and methods.
- adolph 5y ago
  The perverting the course of justice charge alleges the trio disclosed information that law enforcement could access encrypted EncroChat data. https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/news/operation-venetic-police-worker-among-three-charged https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/news/operation-veneti...
- LatteLazy 5y ago
  In the UK, defense lawyers aren't allowed to reveal details if it harms future police operations. So again you don't need parallel construction.
  - pc86 5y ago
    Does this result in a lot of sealed/private hearings where methods of gathering evidence are discussed? I'd imagine the majority of criminal prosecutions would involve at least some "trade secrets" (for lack of a better term) on the part of the police.

gpderetta 5y ago

I don't think there is a fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine in UK. Of course there might be other reasons not to admit to illegally obtained evidence.

faverin 5y ago
There isn't. Until very recently (Human Rights Act) justice was deemed to have been served by bringing all evidence to the court. The ECHR gave some rights which now have to be balanced against justice but its still anything goes. There is some interesting court ruling on Azima Rakia hacking case too. Interestingly the courts are waiting for the case where computer hacking infringes on people's right to privacy... Rather than pretend i'll quote a leading case. Woman faked her hand palsy and was filmed illegally by the insurance agents...this is the appeal rulign (so important in uk legal terms) Jones v University of Warwick [2003] EWCA Civ 15 https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2003/151.html https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2003/151.html That leaves the issue as to how the court should exercise its discretion in the difficult situation confronting the district judge and Judge Harris. The court must try to give effect to what are here the two conflicting public interests. The weight to be attached to each will vary according to the circumstances. The significance of the evidence will differ as will the gravity of the breach of Article 8, according to the facts of the particular case. The decision will depend on all the circumstances. Here, the court cannot ignore the reality of the situation. This is not a case where the conduct of the defendant's insurers is so outrageous that the defence should be struck out. The case, therefore, has to be tried. It would be artificial and undesirable for the actual evidence, which is relevant and admissible, not to be placed before the judge who has the task of trying the case. We accept Mr Owen's submission that to exclude the use of the evidence would create a wholly undesirable situation. Fresh medical experts would have to be instructed on both sides. Evidence which is relevant would have to be concealed from them, perhaps resulting in a misdiagnosis; and it would not be possible to cross-examine the claimant appropriately. For these reasons we do not consider it would be right to interfere with the Judge's decision not to exclude the evidence. Mr Weir's submission that we should determine the issue on the basis of the facts as they were before the district judge is not realistic. Nonetheless, it is right that we should make clear that we do not accept that the criticism of the claimant's legal advisers for deciding not to reveal the contents of the video films in issue to their medical experts is justified. It was sensible to defer doing so until it was known whether the evidence could be used. While not excluding the evidence it is appropriate to make clear that the conduct of the insurers was improper and not justified. We disagree with the indication by Judge Harris to the contrary. The fact that the insurers may have been motivated by a desire to achieve what they considered would be a just result does not justify either the commission of trespass or the contravention of the claimant's privacy which took place. We come to this conclusion irrespective of whether Mr Weir is right in contending that in this particular case the evidence could be obtained by other means. Excluding the evidence is not, moreover, the only weapon in the court's armoury. The court has other steps it can take to discourage conduct of the type of which complaint is made. In particular it can reflect its disapproval in the orders for costs which it makes. In this appeal, we therefore propose, because the conduct of the insurers gave rise to the litigation over admissibility of the evidence which has followed upon their conduct, to order the defendants to pay the costs of these proceedings to resolve this issue before the district judge, Judge Harris and this court even though we otherwise dismiss the appeal. This is subject to Mr Owen having an opportunity to persuade us to do otherwise. In addition, we would indicate to the trial judge that when he comes to deal with the question of costs he should take into account the defendant's conduct which is the subject of this appeal when deciding the appropriate order for costs. He may consider the costs of the inquiry agent should not be recovered. If he concludes, as the complainant now contends, that there is an innocent explanation for what is shown as to the claimant's control of her movements then this is a matter which should be reflected in costs, perhaps by ordering the defendants to pay the costs throughout on an indemnity basis. In giving effect to the overriding objective, and taking into account the wider interests of the administration of justice, the court must while doing justice between the parties, also deter improper conduct of a party while conducting litigation. We do not pretend that this is a perfect reconciliation of the conflicting public interests. It is not; but at least the solution does not ignore the insurer's conduct.

bserge 5y ago

Similar to how companies "don't discriminate" when hiring or firing.

avianlyric 5y ago

I’m a little confused could you explain a little more detail why you think this is parallel construction? You’re probably right that they already knew who he was, and probably had some evidence that he was drug dealing, certainly enough to arrest him. But unequivocally proving he’s a dealer is still tricky, especially establishing intent. The image made it possible to tie the individuals real world identity to their “anonymous” identity, and thus associate it with clear intent to distribute drugs (presumably they also had his chat history). If the chat system he was using was compromised by police with a lawful warrant to compromise the service, then what right was violated? How is it different to police infiltrating online forums, or even just physical locations that dealers are know to spend time in?

asddubs 5y ago

yup, this is the first thing that sprung to my mind as well. yeah right, they analyzed his palm in a blurry photo. give me a break. they monitored him in some way that was illegal and then used this as the cover story

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

heywherelogingo 5y ago

The BBC is used to nudge people into behaving as preferred by higher-ups - it's a propaganda organisation. The police are basically government thugs - not law abiding where they can get away with it. So whether your interpretation is correct or not, I don't know, but you're right that this story is probably untrue.

hristov 5y ago

Why would it be a violation of his rights? The police have a right to investigate and they sure have a right to gather fingerprints from drugs.

pbhjpbhj 5y ago
Do they, for example, have a right to decrypt emails for the purposes of data mining? I'd have thought they needed a warrant and/or reasonable suspicion before they're allowed to just mine anyone and everyone's private communications. Are UK police, for example, allowed to run fingerprint and facial matching algos against all image-based content uploaded to Facebook/YouTube/Instagram/whatever? I thought dragnet policing was considered to infringe the right to a private and family life, say? In short the police right to investigate is curtailed, and controlled by the courts and a warrant process, at least.

Fnoord 5y ago

Not needed (Occam's Razor). EncroChat is a gold mine for the police, world wide. Being active there alone is suspicious, and it was effectively a honeypot. High quality picture containing a finger contains fingerprint. You run that through a database and presto.

dokem 5y ago

I'm not following, of course they would have to have his fingerprints also somewhere else.

reledi 5y ago

It's a plausible theory, but they almost definitely would have had prints from him already. The fingers and palm were analysed in the photo. There's a better photo here: https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/may/liverpool-man-latest-to-be-jailed-as-part-of-national-operation-venetic/ https://www.merseyside.police.uk/news/merseyside/news/2021/m... Without any image processing, we can already see palm prints and the ridges and lines in the palm and fingers. These are unique biometric identifiers. In fact, palms have more identifying characteristics than fingerprints. They are almost certainly telling the truth in this story.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]