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What is the current legal thinking on the right to privacy while driving, has there been any legal development recently? In a car on public roads, location (for

by dahart 4y ago

What is the current legal thinking on the right to privacy while driving, has there been any legal development recently? In a car on public roads, location (for example) isn’t something we have historically had a right to keep private. Companies could, and the government sometimes does, legally track license plates or RFID tags on some roads (esp. state borders, bridges, HOV lanes). So we’ve never had a right to not have our whereabouts known or tracked, but companies and the govt have also never been able to track everyone extremely easily until recently. So there’s legitimate concern that the ease and scale of location tracking mean that we should perhaps establish a right to some privacy, but I’m not sure how that stands up to other people’s rights to see you and identify you when you’re in public. I was just thinking about the famous “Photographer’s rights” pamphlet that has gone around the internet for a while, and people who post YouTube videos of being harassed by police or security guards who claim photos can’t be taken of a building or site when the photographer is standing on public ground. The pamphlet patiently explains that you’re allowed to photograph anything visible from public land. Googling, I see a page at ACLU dedicated to the same idea https://www.aclu.org/issues/free-speech/photographers-rights https://www.aclu.org/issues/free-speech/photographers-rights I’m thinking about the future: imagine people made a stink about cars transmitting this data, and companies deciding instead to install cheap cameras everywhere on all roads. How do the photographer’s rights interact with people’s expectations for privacy? What should we expect, and what expectations are unrealistic and need adjusting? Are there any developments were lawmakers are addressing where the right boundaries are between public rights, private data, and the scale of cheap ubiquitous digital tracking?

calvinmorrison 4y ago
this problem is simple to solve, remove license plates. They're pointless anyway.
- dahart 4y ago
  What do you mean? To the DOT, license plates ensure drivers have had basic training and that the vehicle has been inspected for basic safety and emissions standards. To police, the license plates offer a way to find out who the driver is. You might not see direct benefits today, but there certainly is a point to plates. If you find yourself in an accident that is the other party’s fault, you might understand the benefits to you of their license plate being visible. I hope that doesn’t happen to you, but many people in the past have been glad the offender could be identified.
  - calvinmorrison 4y ago
    The side effects cannot be worse than the medicine. License plates and modern data collection practices are far worse than any of the purported benefits.
    - googlryas 4y ago
      I guarantee you 95% of America doesn't agree with you on this.
    - dahart 4y ago
      I’m still not following, could you elaborate on the problems with license plates? What are the negative side effects, and how/why is that “far worse” than meeting safety & emission standards and catching at-fault drivers after accidents? One thing to consider is what would happen if license plates actually did go away. This idea is completely unrealistic- license IDs & license plates (or some way for police to identify you) are never going away. But assuming they did, what would happen? This would mean an astronomical increase in hit and run accidents, in uninsured driving, and in criminal activity from unsafe driving to theft. Do you think that wouldn’t happen, and if so why? Why would having no plates be a better thing than having them?
      - livueta 4y ago
        How about this: e-ink plates plus public-key cryptography. Your actual license number or other identifier, plus a time-based nonce, is encrypted with the DOL's public key. The displayed value changes as the nonce changes according to its schedule, so third-party observers can't correlate the displayed value across time. If you get in a hit-and-run and note the displayed plate, the DOL has the other half of the keypair, the time, and the derivation function for the nonce, so can translate the displayed value to the actual owner. Not being able to publish a single stable value in amber alert cases would be a bit of a regression, but you could still publish what a value would be at a particular time interval. Doesn't do anything about governmental abuses of ALPR data but could be effective at cutting out corporate abuses. I'm probably missing something but it doesn't seem to increase info leakage w.r.t the status quo either - you'd theoretically be able to figure out when a particular image of a plate was taken, but that source would almost definitely be timestamped anyway. e: I don't think "just ban private ALPR" is a solution; it's simply way too easy to do with COTS+FOSS and way too hard to enforce against.
mdp2021 4y ago
> photograph anything visible from public land From public land I can see people sunbathing in their gardens. For a photographer, there may exist an excuse such as "yes but the landscape in the background"... For data such as the routes of a car¹, there is no excuse. (¹Which does not overlap with "what enters or leaves a territory" - monitored in many administrations.)
- dahart 4y ago
  Would you mind elaborating? I don’t know what you mean by ‘excuse’ in either example. You don’t need an excuse as a photographer to capture people sunbathing in their gardens, if you’re standing on public land. And law enforcement doesn’t currently need an excuse for tracking location. In both cases, the real issue is that there is currently (as far as the law is concerned) no “reasonable expectation of privacy” when you’re outside and visible to others.
  - rolph 4y ago
    when when in alaska, and the distance is such that technical or mechanical means are required to observe nude sunbathers, there is no public visibility, the offense is with the fault of the eavesdropper, and it is voyeurism.
    - dahart 4y ago
      Totally, there is a line you can cross, and it might require a telescope or mirrors. There absolutely is an expectation of privacy on private property when there is no public visibility. I wasn’t talking about telescopes or mirrors X-rays or any other tricks, just what you can observe with the naked eye. There probably is a gray area here with zoom lenses that would have to be decided in court, it might come down to intent and not who’s fault it is. I guess that discussion is veering away from the practical question of whether anyone should be able to know who you are if you’re driving on public roads. It doesn’t require any special technical or mechanical means to see people’s license plates and faces from the side of the road or from poles or overpasses, right? What I’m really curious about is whether there should be laws established against such surveillance because it has become too cheap and easy to monitor everyone at once all the time, or whether as a society we deem activity in public space to be public knowledge and not a matter of privacy, whether no privacy should be expected.
RHSeeger 4y ago
I think problem here is one of trying to limit the "pre-crime" instead of the crime itself. We have a problem with companies using mass data surveillance to keep track of the movements, generally of large amounts of people. Trying to stop this by creating laws that prevent taking pictures is almost doomed to fail. Along the same lines, if an office follows someone (they believe might be related to a crime, etc) around town to track their whereabouts, that seems within reason. If the police force (using advances in technology) tracks the whereabouts of all people at all times, it's unreasonable. It's the same thing, just at a different scale. We need to find an effective way to allow the "components" of something that isn't allowed, without allowing the thing itself.
gumby 4y ago
> What is the current legal thinking on the right to privacy while driving I think it’s pretty clear from precedent you have none. Every vehicle displays a unique number in large, readable type, and has for longer than any person has been alive. I haven’t seen any objections. The same applies to driving licenses that are covered in very personal information which is handed over willy-nilly to anyone who asks for it. In California they make it clear that driving is a “privilege”, not something in which you have any rights. Edit: another example: notice that the automatic toll collection systems are always implemented as registration+billing based systems rather than as any kind of privacy-protecting cash-like schemes.
- dahart 4y ago
  I mostly agree on precedent, as far as I know, but I would say that recent developments like the GDPR and others targeting digital practices are probably starting to broach this topic of what is public and what is private. And I’m asking because I don’t know whether precedent is changing right now; I imagine that it is changing in some locales. Googling just now I noticed that California passed a new privacy act in 2020. I’ve seen a lot of discussion and debate, and the idea that cheap mass surveillance technology is a marked departure from what was available before this century does legitimately question whether we can continue operating under the framework where anything done in public is free for someone else to record and consume. That idea is now much, much more prone to abuse than it was 30 years ago, right?
- kortilla 4y ago
  > Every vehicle displays a unique number in large, readable type, and has for longer than any person has been alive. I haven’t seen any objections. Because the bar to getting that data used to be quite high and limited in scope. Now with license plate reader software in conjunction with street light cameras, the dynamic has completely shifted to easily record and store a detailed tracking log for all observed license plate numbers in a city. Big power dynamic changes like that result in fundamental shifts like “right to be forgotten”, the GDPR, etc. The only thing that has prevented an uproar so far is that you can’t go type in your neighbor’s license plate into a website and get that detailed tracking log at the drop of a hat. Similar thing for cell phone location records from cell companies.
samstave 4y ago
There are tech companies that have cameras that track all the vehicles that drive by their campus HQs -- and report the activity back to the city/police
- jamiek88 4y ago
  Seems a rather large claim to make with no further elaboration.
  - franckl 4y ago
    Our HOA uses flock safety cameras with car plate readers that are connected to the local police station. I have zero doubt that large tech companies do the same
  - samstave 4y ago
    I am not going to elaborate due to the fact that I gave details of such on HN about [Fucking Bullshit] company that was doing this sent their lawyers after me, and I had to ask HN to delete the comment...
walnutclosefarm 4y ago
> The pamphlet patiently explains that you’re allowed to photograph anything visible from public land. Or public air space, for that matter.
II2II 4y ago
I have no idea what current legal thought is, but I would hope that it factors in how data is collected. There is a world of difference between observing someone in a public space and using a device attached to private property to collect data. Likewise, there is a difference between passive observations and what is effectively stalking someone. As for photographer's rights, I work in a public space. I don't care whether people photograph me unless it crosses the line of harassment. Likewise, if I notice someone taking photographs of other people's children, I will do my best to make them feel uncomfortable with their actions. Context is always important. The idea of what is public and private data is also constantly changing. I recall governments making public data available online in the mid to late 1990's. Records that you could visit government offices for in prior decades (e.g. certain types of property records) were viewed in a very different light once they became easily accessible. These changes will continue to handle, in part to balance rights but also because we need to address an imbalance of power due to an imbalance in access to information.
asiachick 4y ago
> The pamphlet patiently explains that you’re allowed to photograph anything visible from public land. this might be true in the USA but it is definitely not true in Japan. People's right to privacy trumps your right to take pictures in public. In crowds it's usually not a problem but make a particular person the subject of your photo and you could easily get in trouble. Same for buildings if you publish the photo
gernb 4y ago
This is just my anecdata, but over 30 years of driving, it's only the last 2-3 that have felt like a large percentage of driver no longer care about traffic rules. It used to be it was rare for me to see a major violation. Now it's is literally every single time I go for a drive or ride my bike, at least in the city of San Francisco, that see (a) someone running a red light, (b) someone turning right from the 3rd lane (meaning they should be in the first lane), (c) someone turning left illegally before the on-coming traffic when the light turns green, (d) driving for blocks in the bus only lanes, I even saw someone drive down the wrong way down a one way street to take a short cut. Often I see 2 to 3 of these during a single outing. If more surveillance would stop this then I'm for it. I'm curious what changed (a) my noticing ... I really don't think that's it but it's possible (b) people for some reason no longer giving a fuck (c) too many video games (half joking, half not, personally love video games but of course in a video game you drive however you want. Of course you also kill people in video games (d) cycling culture bleeding into driving culture. (e) ....

by dahart 4y ago

calvinmorrison 4y ago

this problem is simple to solve, remove license plates. They're pointless anyway.

dahart 4y ago
What do you mean? To the DOT, license plates ensure drivers have had basic training and that the vehicle has been inspected for basic safety and emissions standards. To police, the license plates offer a way to find out who the driver is. You might not see direct benefits today, but there certainly is a point to plates. If you find yourself in an accident that is the other party’s fault, you might understand the benefits to you of their license plate being visible. I hope that doesn’t happen to you, but many people in the past have been glad the offender could be identified.
- calvinmorrison 4y ago
  The side effects cannot be worse than the medicine. License plates and modern data collection practices are far worse than any of the purported benefits.
  - googlryas 4y ago
    I guarantee you 95% of America doesn't agree with you on this.
  - dahart 4y ago
    I’m still not following, could you elaborate on the problems with license plates? What are the negative side effects, and how/why is that “far worse” than meeting safety & emission standards and catching at-fault drivers after accidents? One thing to consider is what would happen if license plates actually did go away. This idea is completely unrealistic- license IDs & license plates (or some way for police to identify you) are never going away. But assuming they did, what would happen? This would mean an astronomical increase in hit and run accidents, in uninsured driving, and in criminal activity from unsafe driving to theft. Do you think that wouldn’t happen, and if so why? Why would having no plates be a better thing than having them?
    - livueta 4y ago
      How about this: e-ink plates plus public-key cryptography. Your actual license number or other identifier, plus a time-based nonce, is encrypted with the DOL's public key. The displayed value changes as the nonce changes according to its schedule, so third-party observers can't correlate the displayed value across time. If you get in a hit-and-run and note the displayed plate, the DOL has the other half of the keypair, the time, and the derivation function for the nonce, so can translate the displayed value to the actual owner. Not being able to publish a single stable value in amber alert cases would be a bit of a regression, but you could still publish what a value would be at a particular time interval. Doesn't do anything about governmental abuses of ALPR data but could be effective at cutting out corporate abuses. I'm probably missing something but it doesn't seem to increase info leakage w.r.t the status quo either - you'd theoretically be able to figure out when a particular image of a plate was taken, but that source would almost definitely be timestamped anyway. e: I don't think "just ban private ALPR" is a solution; it's simply way too easy to do with COTS+FOSS and way too hard to enforce against.

mdp2021 4y ago

> photograph anything visible from public land From public land I can see people sunbathing in their gardens. For a photographer, there may exist an excuse such as "yes but the landscape in the background"... For data such as the routes of a car¹, there is no excuse. (¹Which does not overlap with "what enters or leaves a territory" - monitored in many administrations.)

dahart 4y ago
Would you mind elaborating? I don’t know what you mean by ‘excuse’ in either example. You don’t need an excuse as a photographer to capture people sunbathing in their gardens, if you’re standing on public land. And law enforcement doesn’t currently need an excuse for tracking location. In both cases, the real issue is that there is currently (as far as the law is concerned) no “reasonable expectation of privacy” when you’re outside and visible to others.
- rolph 4y ago
  when when in alaska, and the distance is such that technical or mechanical means are required to observe nude sunbathers, there is no public visibility, the offense is with the fault of the eavesdropper, and it is voyeurism.
  - dahart 4y ago
    Totally, there is a line you can cross, and it might require a telescope or mirrors. There absolutely is an expectation of privacy on private property when there is no public visibility. I wasn’t talking about telescopes or mirrors X-rays or any other tricks, just what you can observe with the naked eye. There probably is a gray area here with zoom lenses that would have to be decided in court, it might come down to intent and not who’s fault it is. I guess that discussion is veering away from the practical question of whether anyone should be able to know who you are if you’re driving on public roads. It doesn’t require any special technical or mechanical means to see people’s license plates and faces from the side of the road or from poles or overpasses, right? What I’m really curious about is whether there should be laws established against such surveillance because it has become too cheap and easy to monitor everyone at once all the time, or whether as a society we deem activity in public space to be public knowledge and not a matter of privacy, whether no privacy should be expected.

RHSeeger 4y ago

I think problem here is one of trying to limit the "pre-crime" instead of the crime itself. We have a problem with companies using mass data surveillance to keep track of the movements, generally of large amounts of people. Trying to stop this by creating laws that prevent taking pictures is almost doomed to fail. Along the same lines, if an office follows someone (they believe might be related to a crime, etc) around town to track their whereabouts, that seems within reason. If the police force (using advances in technology) tracks the whereabouts of all people at all times, it's unreasonable. It's the same thing, just at a different scale. We need to find an effective way to allow the "components" of something that isn't allowed, without allowing the thing itself.

gumby 4y ago

> What is the current legal thinking on the right to privacy while driving I think it’s pretty clear from precedent you have none. Every vehicle displays a unique number in large, readable type, and has for longer than any person has been alive. I haven’t seen any objections. The same applies to driving licenses that are covered in very personal information which is handed over willy-nilly to anyone who asks for it. In California they make it clear that driving is a “privilege”, not something in which you have any rights. Edit: another example: notice that the automatic toll collection systems are always implemented as registration+billing based systems rather than as any kind of privacy-protecting cash-like schemes.

dahart 4y ago
I mostly agree on precedent, as far as I know, but I would say that recent developments like the GDPR and others targeting digital practices are probably starting to broach this topic of what is public and what is private. And I’m asking because I don’t know whether precedent is changing right now; I imagine that it is changing in some locales. Googling just now I noticed that California passed a new privacy act in 2020. I’ve seen a lot of discussion and debate, and the idea that cheap mass surveillance technology is a marked departure from what was available before this century does legitimately question whether we can continue operating under the framework where anything done in public is free for someone else to record and consume. That idea is now much, much more prone to abuse than it was 30 years ago, right?
kortilla 4y ago
> Every vehicle displays a unique number in large, readable type, and has for longer than any person has been alive. I haven’t seen any objections. Because the bar to getting that data used to be quite high and limited in scope. Now with license plate reader software in conjunction with street light cameras, the dynamic has completely shifted to easily record and store a detailed tracking log for all observed license plate numbers in a city. Big power dynamic changes like that result in fundamental shifts like “right to be forgotten”, the GDPR, etc. The only thing that has prevented an uproar so far is that you can’t go type in your neighbor’s license plate into a website and get that detailed tracking log at the drop of a hat. Similar thing for cell phone location records from cell companies.

samstave 4y ago

There are tech companies that have cameras that track all the vehicles that drive by their campus HQs -- and report the activity back to the city/police

jamiek88 4y ago
Seems a rather large claim to make with no further elaboration.
- franckl 4y ago
  Our HOA uses flock safety cameras with car plate readers that are connected to the local police station. I have zero doubt that large tech companies do the same
- samstave 4y ago
  I am not going to elaborate due to the fact that I gave details of such on HN about [Fucking Bullshit] company that was doing this sent their lawyers after me, and I had to ask HN to delete the comment...

walnutclosefarm 4y ago

> The pamphlet patiently explains that you’re allowed to photograph anything visible from public land. Or public air space, for that matter.

II2II 4y ago

I have no idea what current legal thought is, but I would hope that it factors in how data is collected. There is a world of difference between observing someone in a public space and using a device attached to private property to collect data. Likewise, there is a difference between passive observations and what is effectively stalking someone. As for photographer's rights, I work in a public space. I don't care whether people photograph me unless it crosses the line of harassment. Likewise, if I notice someone taking photographs of other people's children, I will do my best to make them feel uncomfortable with their actions. Context is always important. The idea of what is public and private data is also constantly changing. I recall governments making public data available online in the mid to late 1990's. Records that you could visit government offices for in prior decades (e.g. certain types of property records) were viewed in a very different light once they became easily accessible. These changes will continue to handle, in part to balance rights but also because we need to address an imbalance of power due to an imbalance in access to information.

asiachick 4y ago

> The pamphlet patiently explains that you’re allowed to photograph anything visible from public land. this might be true in the USA but it is definitely not true in Japan. People's right to privacy trumps your right to take pictures in public. In crowds it's usually not a problem but make a particular person the subject of your photo and you could easily get in trouble. Same for buildings if you publish the photo

gernb 4y ago

This is just my anecdata, but over 30 years of driving, it's only the last 2-3 that have felt like a large percentage of driver no longer care about traffic rules. It used to be it was rare for me to see a major violation. Now it's is literally every single time I go for a drive or ride my bike, at least in the city of San Francisco, that see (a) someone running a red light, (b) someone turning right from the 3rd lane (meaning they should be in the first lane), (c) someone turning left illegally before the on-coming traffic when the light turns green, (d) driving for blocks in the bus only lanes, I even saw someone drive down the wrong way down a one way street to take a short cut. Often I see 2 to 3 of these during a single outing. If more surveillance would stop this then I'm for it. I'm curious what changed (a) my noticing ... I really don't think that's it but it's possible (b) people for some reason no longer giving a fuck (c) too many video games (half joking, half not, personally love video games but of course in a video game you drive however you want. Of course you also kill people in video games (d) cycling culture bleeding into driving culture. (e) ....