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City Council to install 20 cameras as automated license-plate recognition system

92 points by luu 4y ago

hw-guy 4y ago
What do they do about cars without license plates? I seem to recall that new cars in California are sold with NO plates, not even paper temporary tags.
- bredren 4y ago
  I built and sold a parking enforcement product that uses ALPR from a mobile app. In my customers experience, cars missing “normal” license plates (those without special characters or sports themes) are few enough to not make an impact on broad goals. New cars missing plates completely would be a similarly low portion of consideration. Enforcement of cars missing plates illegally is the duty of patrolling PD. Which is to say, drive around without plates long enough you’ll get pulled over.
  - bluedino 4y ago
    It seems like since Covid closed the DMV, even though they've re-opened, law enforcement has been pretty lax on enforcing license plate laws
  - hw-guy 4y ago
    What happens if you don't pull over? In cities like Philadelphia now (and I'd be surprised if this is not also the case in many CA cities), the police are not allowed to chase cars. So if you want to commit a crime, remove the plate and if the cop tries to pull you over, just drive away! We had a neighborhood meeting with a local police captain in Philly who admitted as much.
- inconceivable 4y ago
  new cars in california are sold with temp tags now. they look the same as the ones in other states.
  - rconti 4y ago
    More or less. For some reason they all have totally different fonts and layouts, but it's a step up from the wild west it used to be.
- deleted 4y ago
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- deleted 4y ago
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- drewda 4y ago
  California has required dealers to put temporary license plates with unique IDs on all cars that don't already have license plates. The change took effect January 1, 2019: https://us.dealertrack.com/content/dealertrack/en/landing-pages/rts/catemptags.html https://us.dealertrack.com/content/dealertrack/en/landing-pa...
  - hw-guy 4y ago
    What was the rationale for not requiring plates? California is also the only state I've driven in where the freeways don't have mile markers. How are people supposed to report the location of an accident or breakdown?
    - toast0 4y ago
      Plates were required always... But plates are sent by mail (mostly), after some processing, so there's a delay between first registration and when the plate can be installed. California finally started doing temporary plates in 2019. California has some mile posts and some numbered exits, but you're expected to report location by named exit. Ex: North on the 405, right after Pico Boulevard. Etc. The California highway system was extensive before federal highway standards were developed, and California was exempted from exit number requirements. In ~2000, California decided to add exit numbers 'over the next ten years' as signs are replaced; twenty years later, it's still not complete, but Google still likes to give directions with exit numbers only, as if that were useful.
- gumby 4y ago
  They changed the law a little while back and now new cars come with a paper number plate. The bridges were complaining that too many people didn’t pay tolls. Steve Jobs used to get a new Mercedes S class every three months so he wouldn’t have to have a plate.
  - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
    When I got my car (used) in 2017 I just left the dealer plates on it for about a year, always keeping it washed.
    - dmd 4y ago
      For both you and gp - why? What's the advantage?
      - selectodude 4y ago
        Being a schmuck and not having to pay tolls. It's stealing from your fellow taxpayers.
        TaylorAlexander 4y ago
        Actually at the time I did not drive on any toll roads.
      - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
        Honestly I was mostly just lazy, I can't think of any real advantage. I guess if I accidentally went late through an intersection and would have been subject to a red light ticket, I would have been saved on that. However I think this has never happened to me, so this is not a real conscious reason for me.
        gumby 4y ago
        Surely they know from the dealer whom that plate number was assigned to. In fact: when they send the metal one does it have the same number?
fortran77 4y ago
Now Palo Alto can catch people from Mountain View who try to sneak into their parks with more efficiency!
- AnotherGoodName 4y ago
  Context: https://paloaltoonline.com/news/2021/01/25/palo-alto-banned-from-bringing-back-residents-only-policy-for-foothills-park https://paloaltoonline.com/news/2021/01/25/palo-alto-banned-... Basically ever since segregation was banned Palo Alto had laws that only 'local residents' could use certain parks. The law was pretty obvious in its intent and the law was struck surprisingly recently.
  - gumby 4y ago
    Read my parallel comment — that wasn’t the reason for excluding non-residents from that one park. It was about the selfish argument made by Los Altos city council. The segregation argument was a good one, but not for the reason you cite. Because of prior segregation, the population of PA is still lopsided, and that meant a resident-only park had an unfair bias. After a bit of a rush when the restriction was dropped, it settled back to its normal quiet state. In reality there was de facto no restriction: the entry gate was rarely staffed and you could always enter through Arastradero Park which, like all the other parks in Palo Alto, has no restrictions at all.
  - marcell 4y ago
    Do you have any basis for saying this law was racist or had segregationist goals? It’s not like the neighboring cities (Mt View and Menlo Park) have many black people. My understanding is that the local resident restrictions were based on some local politics around purchasing the park a long time ago, and then transformed into a Palo Alto NIMBY policy. In 2008 Los Altos Hills tried to buy access to Foothill Park.
    - thatfrenchguy 4y ago
      > It’s not like the neighboring cities (Mt View and Menlo Park) have many black people. East Palo Alto?
chaostheory 4y ago
As we wind down police forces, due to both the political climate and the ever shrinking pool of recruits; mass surveillance is the inevitable stop gap.
- barbazoo 4y ago
  > As we wind down police forces Any sources to back this up?
  - chaostheory 4y ago
    It’s an old problem. Keep in mind that this article is from before Floyd. There are more sources https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/675359781/americas-growing-cop-shortage https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/675359781/americas-growing-co...
    - kevingadd 4y ago
      Your linked article says they're struggling to hire enough cops. This seems like the opposite of winding down a department; they're attempting to grow.
      - chaostheory 4y ago
        Ok I misread the parent comment. Did you not read the other comment next to mine? In case, you can’t read that comment for whatever reason: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/08/13/at-least-13-cities-are-defunding-their-police-departments/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/08/13/at-leas... https://theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund-police-transferring-money-community https://theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund...
  - passwordoops 4y ago
    Here's one example [0]. I'm not sure what, if any, dent this makes relative to historical budget levels in US police forces, or if it truly counts as "winding down". But there are headlines [0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund-police-transferring-money-community https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-de...
renewiltord 4y ago
You can get these plastic license plate covers. I don't know of anyone who has gotten caught using them and I see them everywhere. The red light cameras can't catch you and you can risk t-boning people at will.
- kvetching 4y ago
  wow....
- rconti 4y ago
  I very, very rarely see the license plate obscuring plastic covers. They're pretty obvious when you see them. Other covers (tinted, clear, whatever) are only used for aesthetic purposes, and they might somewhat reduce the success rate of ANPRs, but that's not the main goal.
  - renewiltord 4y ago
    The red light camera on Bryant won't catch you with it on. If PA is using what SF is, it should be safe. My impression with these cameras is that they're like the US Postal Police. On the Internet, everyone describes them as unflinching bulldogs of the law. In reality, they're more like Scrappy Doo.
  - loeg 4y ago
    I don't know where you live but I see plate-obscuring covers all the time in Seattle. We have several local toll highways, which is probably related.
- jollyllama 4y ago
  It's not much of a solution because these types of things open you up to selective enforcement.
- reaperducer 4y ago
  According to a friend who works in administration at a big city police department, most of them don't work.
javajosh 4y ago
So, a local government going after a small subset of positional data. Good heavens, doesn't Ring already do facial recognition and license plates and give well-heeled clients access to that feed?
prpl 4y ago
disclaimer: I live close to east oakland As mentioned, everybody is supposed to have a license plate - even a temporary one. In reality, it’s rarely to never enforced, cars and/or license plates are frequently stolen (especially Hyundai/Kia), all manner e-ink plates even stickers plates are allowed. Frankly this has really enabled a cottage industry of thieves and criminals. I’m generally against a surveillance state, but the utter lack of enforcement on this issue enables and possibly encourages a range crimes
- pound 4y ago
  e-ink plates, as well as sticker plates are parts of dmv pilot program. it's not some overlooked violation.
  - michaelt 4y ago
    Perhaps I don't fully understand the situation in America (in my country a vehicle will generally have a license plate when it rolls off the dealer's lot, which stays on the vehicle throughout its entire life) but what would anyone need an e-ink plate for?
    - miriam_catira 4y ago
      It's actually different per state - different laws and levels of enforcement. Some states you can't drive off the lot without a plate, others give temporary ones. That makes selling cars faster, in a state with a terrible Dept. of Motor Vehicles, like CA - where the town in question is located.
      - drewda 4y ago
        What's so terrible about the California DMV? In recent years, they've done a huge digital modernization effort. When I had to renew my license in person within the last year, I completed almost all of the application online. I could also upload and submit documents for pre-review for a REAL ID. The website let me book an appointment at a nearby DMV office. I can't remember exactly how long it took overall, but compared to many other governmental or big business processes, it was a perfectly fine process. Now, the California DMV's approval of AVs without safety drivers... that I do have many more concerns about...
thewebcount 4y ago
I get why some residents want this, but won't the result be that criminals will do one of the following: - Remove their plates before committing a crime - Use stolen plates - Make fake plates and put them on other vehicles and have friends drive them around far away places at the same time so they can say, "Your readers must be broken!" - Make note of where the readers are (since they're fixed) and avoid using those streets during their crimes? - Other stuff I'm probably not thinking of The amount of abuse by the police that this opens the citizens up to is just ridiculous.
- selectodude 4y ago
  I can't speak for Palo Alto, but here in Chicago, the cars are almost always stolen. So the LPRs are pretty darn helpful. Nobody is removing plates from a stolen vehicle (no time, gotta get away), and after the victim calls police, they can flag the plate.
  - wintogreen74 4y ago
    Except (at least where I live) the cars are stolen and used in crimes immediately, well before they're reported stolen and entered into the database. The rightful owner is more likely to be shot in their own home by some trigger-happy cop coming to arrest them, than actually catching a criminal through this mass data collection joke.
    - whythre 4y ago
      Ridiculous. Cops don’t typically storm homes because of stolen vehicles. Cars are stolen All. The. Time. Law enforcement officers know a car’s original owner is not typically the guy going for a joyride.
      - Dylan16807 4y ago
        That doesn't disprove the previous statement. Maybe cops are almost always aware of that and do the right thing, but the system is even more useless. In that situation you'd get more arrest shootings than caught criminals.
bnastic 4y ago
UK: hold my beer while I show you our ANPR that's literally everywhere
- wjdp 4y ago
  This is very much something I've not thought much about. There's doesn't seem to be publicised cases where this is abused and having a system where any stolen vehicle can be pinged on major roads is a rather useful thing to have.
- bearmode 4y ago
  There are also sane plate laws in the UK, and plates are tied to a specific vehicle make/model, and the plates are larger, more visible, and far easier for automated systems to read.
robopsychology 4y ago
There's been several armed robberies in Palo Alto Midtown recently - I personally don't mind increased security if it reduces those.
- wintogreen74 4y ago
  You're in the bullseye of the law enforcement pitch then. There are lots of ways to address armed robberies without mass surveillance. They'll pitch this as "one more tool to fight crime <x>" but you wait, it will actually be "THE tool for preventing a wide range of behaviors, some maybe even illegal!"
  - loeg 4y ago
    You've totally failed to respond to GP's comment. Do you think this will be ineffective at its stated goals?
    - michaelt 4y ago
      I think it's very unlikely there will be a statistically significant increase in violent crime conviction rates when these cameras go into action.
    - serf 4y ago
      Surveillance has never been greater -- are cities markedly less violent than in the past? (No, urban/city violence is on the rise..[0]) [0]: https://www.city-journal.org/article/criminal-neglect https://www.city-journal.org/article/criminal-neglect
      - loeg 4y ago
        Crime has been on a largely downward trend since the 90s. Yes, there has been a partial reverse since 2020, associated with a general breakdown in norms during Covid. But the broader trend is down.
      - Dylan16807 4y ago
wintogreen74 4y ago
>> Mark Shull, a Palo Alto resident since 1983 ... Until last year, he had never experienced property theft ... "Palo Alto has a serious and growing property theft problem," Shull said. I wish I lived in a city where 2 converter thefts every 4 decades was the bar for "serious theft problem". The idea that this will "deter criminals" is a joke. That's as likely as hidden photo radar slowing down drivers. The police chief with statements like "Oh we won't deploy this to residential areas, unless it's on a temporary basis for a specific crime spree" - does 2 thefts in a week, after 40 years count as a spree? targeting "areas where we're seeing the most amount of crimes we think these would solve." - why not deploy actual police officers to these areas? Look, I'm a law-abiding citizen, property owner, and as fed up with the light treatment of property crime as these people, but giving carte blanche to private companies to sell tools of mass surveillance and only go on the word of politicians and law enforcement to "trust us"? No thanks.
- bushbaba 4y ago
  even with video evidence thats not enough to charge. this is equivalent to security system...deter criminals and encourage crimes be done in an easier area.
- megablast 4y ago
  > That's as likely as hidden photo radar slowing down drivers. Of course it does. What a silly comment.
  - mikestew 4y ago
    “Hidden”? What am I, a driver, slowing down for exactly? The camera I can’t see?
    - krisoft 4y ago
      You get notified that you got penalty points for speeding and then you slow down everywhere because you don’t want to lose your licence.
tptacek 4y ago
Presumably because of the title, people are making this a thread about license plates. But Flock (a YC company!) does a whole bunch of ML image classification stuff; think of it as something closer to a Google search for cars that have traversed your municipality in the last week, searchable not just by plate but by make, model, and distinguishing characteristics; you can even track cars by bumper sticker. We went through this exercise last year in Oak Park, with our local PD requesting 20+ cameras --- a tactical misstep, because they'd been piloting a small number of cameras, and the larger request drove their acquisition costs across the threshold of needing board approval, which they were surprised to discover was contentious. Because the board was split on the prospect of giving OPPD a Village-wide "Google for all movements of any car everywhere" capability, we were able to extract concessions. We got board approval for a much-reduced deployment (I think we have 8 cameras), contingent on recommendations from our citizen police oversight and IT commissions (I'm on one of those). In the end, we got a General Order issued from OPPD limiting the use of cameras to violent crime, all uses traceable to case numbers reviewable by our police oversight commission, no usage from personal machines by OPPD staff but rather only OPPD-issued equipment, mandatory 2FA, and some other things I forget. We were much less successful at regulating data sharing. This is a huge feature of Flock, and part of its viral customer acquisition strategy. OPPD found out about Flock by getting access to data from neighboring municipalities; many police departments run "transparency portals" to show you who they're sharing with, and it's often "every law enforcement agency in the region". Which makes sense, if you look at it from the perspective of the police department! But it makes it much harder to regulate how cameras are used, because our PD can't issue General Orders for other PDs, and Flock doesn't appear to provide any tools to enforce limits on data sharing. The obvious thing to ask for in a pilot deployment is "turn all the sharing off", but that's hard when Flock's foot in the door was sharing from some other department. I'd have been happier if we'd ended up with zero Flock cameras, but I'm not sure how political realistic that would have been, and I'm surprised we were able to extract as many concessions as we did. Probably the most important thing we got was a commitment to a review of the effectiveness of the cameras after a year; presumably, if OPPD can't tie the cameras to solving specific violent crimes, we'll stop paying for the cameras. The Village Board didn't enjoy being blindsided by a random acquisition request, and demanded a process be put in place for future surveillance tech requests. So one happy side effect of this is that we teed up ACLU CCOPS†, which I expect to see passed in the next couple months. CCOPS theoretically prevents municipal agencies from deploying surveillance tech without board approval, even if the cost is below purchasing thresholds. Get involved in this stuff. You'd be surprised how little engagement there is at the local level, which is where a lot of the most important governing decisions are made. † https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/community-control-over-police-surveillance-ccops-model-bill https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/community-control-over-p...
drewda 4y ago
Los Altos Hills also recently installed Flock ALPRs. It's amusing how they allow residents to fill out a form on the town website to opt-out: https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/455/Automatic-License-Plate-Readers-ALPR https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/455/Automatic-License-Plate... In other words, you can opt-out of having your comings and goings monitored... as long as you own at least 1 acre of land (LAH's minimum lot size) in one of the top 10 wealthiest ZIP codes in the country.
- jackson1442 4y ago
  It seems like you can rent as well. I’m from Texas but my car is registered to my apartment’s address which seems like all they require. Would love to see better privacy legislation that would require an opt out for everyone though.
- zbrozek 4y ago
  The town installed it on a one-year trial basis. The cameras didn't break any cases and cost the town a huge amount of money to pay for police overtime to review all the footage. The city council voted unanimously to make them permanent, even in the face of clear evidence that they were useless. Why? To be seen to be doing something. They even said so in the resolution. Check out the staff report on page 335 of the agenda packet PDF. https://losaltoshillsca.portal.civicclerk.com/event/2742/files https://losaltoshillsca.portal.civicclerk.com/event/2742/fil... The final paragraphs before hitting boilerplate were especially galling: Even though residential burglaries are at an all-time high since the system was installed and no direct correlation can be made between the system and a reduction in residential burglaries, the cameras remain a tool that the Sheriff’s Office can use to help solve ongoing crime in Town and have been successful in solving other types of crimes. It is impossible to tell whether the presence of the cameras themselves could have deterred additional burglaries from happening, but in all, the cameras remain a reminder to the citizens of Los Altos Hills that the Town cares about their safety and that the Council is actively trying to reduce crime from occurring in Town.
  - WillPostForFood 4y ago
    The cameras didn't break any cases That's not true, the page right before the one you quoted: During this evaluation period, a total of four suspects were arrested in two separate and ongoing investigations. Two were arrested for an armed robbery and carjacking that occurred in Cupertino and two were arrested while driving a stolen vehicle and committing various thefts in Town.
exabrial 4y ago
Illegal search. Why is this still a thing?
- dhbanes 4y ago
  How is this any more illegal than a cop calling in a license plate number of any random vehicle they see on the road (which is not at all illegal)?
  - mixmastamyk 4y ago
    Automation changes the character of the policy and enforcement. This has been recognized before.
    - Kbelicius 4y ago
      GPs question still stands. Changing the character of policy and enforcement doesn't turn automatically reading license plates into illegal search. At least there isn't any obvious logical way to come to that conclusion. Do you care to point it out?
      - mixmastamyk 3y ago
        Appears you’ve read it as a defense, but comment was meant as a side point.
- anigbrowl 4y ago
  Nope, far from it.
thot_experiment 4y ago
This would be fine if all the data was public, that is the only way to make public surveillance systems do more harm than good.
- JKCalhoun 4y ago
  Maybe someone should assemble and open-source a license plate reader we can all carry — crowd-source pushing packets to a web site where cars + licenses are displayed on a map. It would more or less make the data egalitarian, make some kind of point maybe? I'm actually not averse to license plate readers. I'm not a privacy absolutist. I lean toward the privacy where you have the "expectation of privacy" but I could be convinced license plate readers cross that line.
egberts1 4y ago
The best license plate readers are the ones that not only optically lift those alphanumeric symbols off of either license plate but also does: 1. identify your car stereo bluetooth ID 2. any bluetooth devices on your vehicle 3. has direct access to national registry of stolen plates 4. and a mobile modem in which to send alerts with. 5. HD webcam auto-zooming to the driver's side of the vehicle. 6. lift On-Star ID Hey, what do I know? I'm just spitballing out there.
- kevingadd 4y ago
  Make sure to also identify all the passengers and any wireless devices they're carrying. You might catch a big crime network of people who hang out in their cars and talk about driving 7 mph over the limit on the highway while not wearing a seatbelt. You could build a big network of connections, maybe it would turn out that speeding is a social contagion and sending the worst speeders to a forced re-education program would deter the rest from speeding! /s
  - egberts1 3y ago
    Like I said, this is just a spitball attempt to raise awareness of "license-plater readers" and something something about individual freedom.
- tutorialmanager 3y ago
  Don't forget to identify any political bumper stickers.
  - egberts1 3y ago
    Wouldnt work in America, ya know, free speech and all. But the rest of the world, quite likely, even got support of GPRS or whatever it's called nowadays.
kyleblarson 4y ago
This is all moot until activist prosecutors and judges stop coddling criminals and start enforcing the rule of law.
- electriclove 4y ago
  Why the downvotes? Shouldn’t those committing armed robbery and property theft be punished?
megablast 4y ago
Good. Every car should be tracked. They are far too dangerous. Crazy we have so many rules for guns, but not cars. Guns have to be locked up, but not cars??
jfghi 4y ago
If these criminals are caught for thefts, should the wealthier jurisdictions also pay for their justice via taxes?
- dhbanes 4y ago
  Wealthier jurisdictions already do pay in the form of police expenditures. The vast majority of crime committed in wealthier jurisdictions is by people who do not live or pay taxes within the jurisdiction.
stevesearer 4y ago
We have ALPR in Santa Barbara at the city parking lots. These have 72-hour data retention and 30-day data retention at the airport and waterfront. While SB’s are not placed around the city to track all license plates like the ones in Palo Alto, Reifschneider’s statement of Palo Alto’s retention limits being “the shortest in the state” is not fully accurate. PDF: https://santabarbaraca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-06/Final%20City%20of%20Santa%20Barbara%20ALPR%20Policy.pdf https://santabarbaraca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-06/Final...
musicale 4y ago
Wow, this is sinister and really needs to stop.
jrockway 4y ago
> "We need to deter criminals from finding Palo Alto to be a nice, easy target," Burke said during Monday's hearing. "That needs to stop." This is like peak 2023. You create a little bubble where the cost to commit a crime increases slightly, so some percentage of criminals just go somewhere else, maybe even the next neighborhood over, where the risk is lower. Meanwhile, nobody is willing to fund the support services necessary to actually reduce the incentive to commit a crime, so crime numbers stay the same or go up, but they happen to someone else instead of you. Great stuff. If they install some spikes on their park benches homelessness will be solved too! And all with just a few dollars and a 1 hour board meeting. Incredible. Eventually everyone decides to play the arms race (but mom they have cameras the next town over) and we get the surveillance dystopia that nobody really wanted. Anyone who tries to fix it now has to face "but now randos are stealing muh catalytic converters" as an argument against taking down the cameras. And meanwhile, people still don't have food, shelter, medical care, or a support network. But we spent all that money. It just blows my mind and no I'm not going to run for office to fix it. Sorry.
- voz_ 4y ago
  > Eventually everyone decides to play the arms race If everyone plays the arms race, and its hard to commit crime anywhere, we win? This is fundamentally a good thing. "We" here being the hard working members of society that don't turn to crime, and would rather not be victims to it. It is very fashionable and woke to wax poetically about services, and yea, we have serious gaps there, but if someone is going to commit a crime, they should face the consequences.
  - balls187 4y ago
    Catching criminals is a game of cat and mouse. I agree-face consequences. But, it just seems as though the public is tacitly trading in freedoms for security theater, with little real benefit to society.
    - KerrAvon 4y ago
      People really need to stop getting all of their societal knowledge from various iterations of Ocean’s 11.
Nifty3929 4y ago
I got a lot of pushback on a comment that I left regarding surveillance in another thread yesterday, but I feel especially vindicated by this so I'll repost it here: --- The main problem I see is that people are completely distracted by privacy from corporations - when what we really need to be worried about is privacy from our own governments. So much ink is spilled talking about cookies, ads tracking, etc. But really what's the worst a corporation is going to do? Try to sell you something? Meanwhile, we continue to allow our governments to regulate and legislate ever more intrusive invasions of our privacy. And they can put us in jail, or worse. This also gets blurry as governments take increasing control of companies, to the point that some are just about arms of the government, surveilling us in ways that the government can't (yet) do on their own - and being forced to pass that data to the government under penalty of law themselves. --- A lot of the pushback I got is that corporations can do bad things with your data, which of course is true. We should strive for privacy in the general sense, from corporations and our government. I just think, especially outside HN, that the the conversation is far too heavily weighted toward corporations when the far greater harm comes from our governments - and almost no time in general public media is given to this. I got some pushback as well that if corporations surveil you, they give your data to the government anyway, so it's important to have privacy from corporations. Which is ironic, since that's much like what I said in my last paragraph. We need privacy generally, but I see law after law and article after article talking about privacy from corporations, while our governments are gaining more and more ground into surveilling us - often with the help of corporations. But let's keep the focus on exactly how our governments are spying on us and try to address that. Ad-targeting is a small problem compared to the bigger issue of government surveillance - often via corporations (even if I agree that corporate spying is also a problem). Let's focus on some laws that take away the governments ability to demand our data from Google, FB, etc. Let's stop allowing our governments to put cameras all over the place. Let's demand that our intelligence agencies stop spying on us with wide nets. Let's stop allowing our police forces to buy sophisticated tracking software and phone break-in software.
LazyMans 3y ago
This may not have worked well for this specific PD for whatever reason, but Flock is already solving 5% of all US crime today. That’s pretty amazing.

92 points by luu 4y ago

What do they do about cars without license plates? I seem to recall that new cars in California are sold with NO plates, not even paper temporary tags.

bredren 4y ago
I built and sold a parking enforcement product that uses ALPR from a mobile app. In my customers experience, cars missing “normal” license plates (those without special characters or sports themes) are few enough to not make an impact on broad goals. New cars missing plates completely would be a similarly low portion of consideration. Enforcement of cars missing plates illegally is the duty of patrolling PD. Which is to say, drive around without plates long enough you’ll get pulled over.
- bluedino 4y ago
  It seems like since Covid closed the DMV, even though they've re-opened, law enforcement has been pretty lax on enforcing license plate laws
- hw-guy 4y ago
  What happens if you don't pull over? In cities like Philadelphia now (and I'd be surprised if this is not also the case in many CA cities), the police are not allowed to chase cars. So if you want to commit a crime, remove the plate and if the cop tries to pull you over, just drive away! We had a neighborhood meeting with a local police captain in Philly who admitted as much.
inconceivable 4y ago
new cars in california are sold with temp tags now. they look the same as the ones in other states.
- rconti 4y ago
  More or less. For some reason they all have totally different fonts and layouts, but it's a step up from the wild west it used to be.
deleted 4y ago
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drewda 4y ago
California has required dealers to put temporary license plates with unique IDs on all cars that don't already have license plates. The change took effect January 1, 2019: https://us.dealertrack.com/content/dealertrack/en/landing-pages/rts/catemptags.html https://us.dealertrack.com/content/dealertrack/en/landing-pa...
- hw-guy 4y ago
  What was the rationale for not requiring plates? California is also the only state I've driven in where the freeways don't have mile markers. How are people supposed to report the location of an accident or breakdown?
  - toast0 4y ago
    Plates were required always... But plates are sent by mail (mostly), after some processing, so there's a delay between first registration and when the plate can be installed. California finally started doing temporary plates in 2019. California has some mile posts and some numbered exits, but you're expected to report location by named exit. Ex: North on the 405, right after Pico Boulevard. Etc. The California highway system was extensive before federal highway standards were developed, and California was exempted from exit number requirements. In ~2000, California decided to add exit numbers 'over the next ten years' as signs are replaced; twenty years later, it's still not complete, but Google still likes to give directions with exit numbers only, as if that were useful.
gumby 4y ago
They changed the law a little while back and now new cars come with a paper number plate. The bridges were complaining that too many people didn’t pay tolls. Steve Jobs used to get a new Mercedes S class every three months so he wouldn’t have to have a plate.
- TaylorAlexander 4y ago
  When I got my car (used) in 2017 I just left the dealer plates on it for about a year, always keeping it washed.
  - dmd 4y ago
    For both you and gp - why? What's the advantage?
    - selectodude 4y ago
      Being a schmuck and not having to pay tolls. It's stealing from your fellow taxpayers.
      - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
        Actually at the time I did not drive on any toll roads.
    - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
      Honestly I was mostly just lazy, I can't think of any real advantage. I guess if I accidentally went late through an intersection and would have been subject to a red light ticket, I would have been saved on that. However I think this has never happened to me, so this is not a real conscious reason for me.
      - gumby 4y ago
        Surely they know from the dealer whom that plate number was assigned to. In fact: when they send the metal one does it have the same number?

fortran77 4y ago

Now Palo Alto can catch people from Mountain View who try to sneak into their parks with more efficiency!

AnotherGoodName 4y ago
Context: https://paloaltoonline.com/news/2021/01/25/palo-alto-banned-from-bringing-back-residents-only-policy-for-foothills-park https://paloaltoonline.com/news/2021/01/25/palo-alto-banned-... Basically ever since segregation was banned Palo Alto had laws that only 'local residents' could use certain parks. The law was pretty obvious in its intent and the law was struck surprisingly recently.
- gumby 4y ago
  Read my parallel comment — that wasn’t the reason for excluding non-residents from that one park. It was about the selfish argument made by Los Altos city council. The segregation argument was a good one, but not for the reason you cite. Because of prior segregation, the population of PA is still lopsided, and that meant a resident-only park had an unfair bias. After a bit of a rush when the restriction was dropped, it settled back to its normal quiet state. In reality there was de facto no restriction: the entry gate was rarely staffed and you could always enter through Arastradero Park which, like all the other parks in Palo Alto, has no restrictions at all.
- marcell 4y ago
  Do you have any basis for saying this law was racist or had segregationist goals? It’s not like the neighboring cities (Mt View and Menlo Park) have many black people. My understanding is that the local resident restrictions were based on some local politics around purchasing the park a long time ago, and then transformed into a Palo Alto NIMBY policy. In 2008 Los Altos Hills tried to buy access to Foothill Park.
  - thatfrenchguy 4y ago
    > It’s not like the neighboring cities (Mt View and Menlo Park) have many black people. East Palo Alto?

chaostheory 4y ago

As we wind down police forces, due to both the political climate and the ever shrinking pool of recruits; mass surveillance is the inevitable stop gap.

barbazoo 4y ago
> As we wind down police forces Any sources to back this up?
- chaostheory 4y ago
  It’s an old problem. Keep in mind that this article is from before Floyd. There are more sources https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/675359781/americas-growing-cop-shortage https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/675359781/americas-growing-co...
  - kevingadd 4y ago
    Your linked article says they're struggling to hire enough cops. This seems like the opposite of winding down a department; they're attempting to grow.
    - chaostheory 4y ago
      Ok I misread the parent comment. Did you not read the other comment next to mine? In case, you can’t read that comment for whatever reason: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/08/13/at-least-13-cities-are-defunding-their-police-departments/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/08/13/at-leas... https://theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund-police-transferring-money-community https://theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund...
- passwordoops 4y ago
  Here's one example [0]. I'm not sure what, if any, dent this makes relative to historical budget levels in US police forces, or if it truly counts as "winding down". But there are headlines [0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund-police-transferring-money-community https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-de...

renewiltord 4y ago

You can get these plastic license plate covers. I don't know of anyone who has gotten caught using them and I see them everywhere. The red light cameras can't catch you and you can risk t-boning people at will.

kvetching 4y ago
wow....
rconti 4y ago
I very, very rarely see the license plate obscuring plastic covers. They're pretty obvious when you see them. Other covers (tinted, clear, whatever) are only used for aesthetic purposes, and they might somewhat reduce the success rate of ANPRs, but that's not the main goal.
- renewiltord 4y ago
  The red light camera on Bryant won't catch you with it on. If PA is using what SF is, it should be safe. My impression with these cameras is that they're like the US Postal Police. On the Internet, everyone describes them as unflinching bulldogs of the law. In reality, they're more like Scrappy Doo.
- loeg 4y ago
  I don't know where you live but I see plate-obscuring covers all the time in Seattle. We have several local toll highways, which is probably related.
jollyllama 4y ago
It's not much of a solution because these types of things open you up to selective enforcement.
reaperducer 4y ago
According to a friend who works in administration at a big city police department, most of them don't work.

javajosh 4y ago

So, a local government going after a small subset of positional data. Good heavens, doesn't Ring already do facial recognition and license plates and give well-heeled clients access to that feed?

prpl 4y ago

disclaimer: I live close to east oakland As mentioned, everybody is supposed to have a license plate - even a temporary one. In reality, it’s rarely to never enforced, cars and/or license plates are frequently stolen (especially Hyundai/Kia), all manner e-ink plates even stickers plates are allowed. Frankly this has really enabled a cottage industry of thieves and criminals. I’m generally against a surveillance state, but the utter lack of enforcement on this issue enables and possibly encourages a range crimes

pound 4y ago
e-ink plates, as well as sticker plates are parts of dmv pilot program. it's not some overlooked violation.
- michaelt 4y ago
  Perhaps I don't fully understand the situation in America (in my country a vehicle will generally have a license plate when it rolls off the dealer's lot, which stays on the vehicle throughout its entire life) but what would anyone need an e-ink plate for?
  - miriam_catira 4y ago
    It's actually different per state - different laws and levels of enforcement. Some states you can't drive off the lot without a plate, others give temporary ones. That makes selling cars faster, in a state with a terrible Dept. of Motor Vehicles, like CA - where the town in question is located.
    - drewda 4y ago
      What's so terrible about the California DMV? In recent years, they've done a huge digital modernization effort. When I had to renew my license in person within the last year, I completed almost all of the application online. I could also upload and submit documents for pre-review for a REAL ID. The website let me book an appointment at a nearby DMV office. I can't remember exactly how long it took overall, but compared to many other governmental or big business processes, it was a perfectly fine process. Now, the California DMV's approval of AVs without safety drivers... that I do have many more concerns about...

thewebcount 4y ago

I get why some residents want this, but won't the result be that criminals will do one of the following: - Remove their plates before committing a crime - Use stolen plates - Make fake plates and put them on other vehicles and have friends drive them around far away places at the same time so they can say, "Your readers must be broken!" - Make note of where the readers are (since they're fixed) and avoid using those streets during their crimes? - Other stuff I'm probably not thinking of The amount of abuse by the police that this opens the citizens up to is just ridiculous.

selectodude 4y ago
I can't speak for Palo Alto, but here in Chicago, the cars are almost always stolen. So the LPRs are pretty darn helpful. Nobody is removing plates from a stolen vehicle (no time, gotta get away), and after the victim calls police, they can flag the plate.
- wintogreen74 4y ago
  Except (at least where I live) the cars are stolen and used in crimes immediately, well before they're reported stolen and entered into the database. The rightful owner is more likely to be shot in their own home by some trigger-happy cop coming to arrest them, than actually catching a criminal through this mass data collection joke.
  - whythre 4y ago
    Ridiculous. Cops don’t typically storm homes because of stolen vehicles. Cars are stolen All. The. Time. Law enforcement officers know a car’s original owner is not typically the guy going for a joyride.
    - Dylan16807 4y ago
      That doesn't disprove the previous statement. Maybe cops are almost always aware of that and do the right thing, but the system is even more useless. In that situation you'd get more arrest shootings than caught criminals.

bnastic 4y ago

UK: hold my beer while I show you our ANPR that's literally everywhere

wjdp 4y ago
This is very much something I've not thought much about. There's doesn't seem to be publicised cases where this is abused and having a system where any stolen vehicle can be pinged on major roads is a rather useful thing to have.
bearmode 4y ago
There are also sane plate laws in the UK, and plates are tied to a specific vehicle make/model, and the plates are larger, more visible, and far easier for automated systems to read.

robopsychology 4y ago

There's been several armed robberies in Palo Alto Midtown recently - I personally don't mind increased security if it reduces those.

wintogreen74 4y ago
You're in the bullseye of the law enforcement pitch then. There are lots of ways to address armed robberies without mass surveillance. They'll pitch this as "one more tool to fight crime <x>" but you wait, it will actually be "THE tool for preventing a wide range of behaviors, some maybe even illegal!"
- loeg 4y ago
  You've totally failed to respond to GP's comment. Do you think this will be ineffective at its stated goals?
  - michaelt 4y ago
    I think it's very unlikely there will be a statistically significant increase in violent crime conviction rates when these cameras go into action.
  - serf 4y ago
    Surveillance has never been greater -- are cities markedly less violent than in the past? (No, urban/city violence is on the rise..[0]) [0]: https://www.city-journal.org/article/criminal-neglect https://www.city-journal.org/article/criminal-neglect
    - loeg 4y ago
      Crime has been on a largely downward trend since the 90s. Yes, there has been a partial reverse since 2020, associated with a general breakdown in norms during Covid. But the broader trend is down.
    - Dylan16807 4y ago

wintogreen74 4y ago

>> Mark Shull, a Palo Alto resident since 1983 ... Until last year, he had never experienced property theft ... "Palo Alto has a serious and growing property theft problem," Shull said. I wish I lived in a city where 2 converter thefts every 4 decades was the bar for "serious theft problem". The idea that this will "deter criminals" is a joke. That's as likely as hidden photo radar slowing down drivers. The police chief with statements like "Oh we won't deploy this to residential areas, unless it's on a temporary basis for a specific crime spree" - does 2 thefts in a week, after 40 years count as a spree? targeting "areas where we're seeing the most amount of crimes we think these would solve." - why not deploy actual police officers to these areas? Look, I'm a law-abiding citizen, property owner, and as fed up with the light treatment of property crime as these people, but giving carte blanche to private companies to sell tools of mass surveillance and only go on the word of politicians and law enforcement to "trust us"? No thanks.

bushbaba 4y ago
even with video evidence thats not enough to charge. this is equivalent to security system...deter criminals and encourage crimes be done in an easier area.
megablast 4y ago
> That's as likely as hidden photo radar slowing down drivers. Of course it does. What a silly comment.
- mikestew 4y ago
  “Hidden”? What am I, a driver, slowing down for exactly? The camera I can’t see?
  - krisoft 4y ago
    You get notified that you got penalty points for speeding and then you slow down everywhere because you don’t want to lose your licence.

tptacek 4y ago

Presumably because of the title, people are making this a thread about license plates. But Flock (a YC company!) does a whole bunch of ML image classification stuff; think of it as something closer to a Google search for cars that have traversed your municipality in the last week, searchable not just by plate but by make, model, and distinguishing characteristics; you can even track cars by bumper sticker. We went through this exercise last year in Oak Park, with our local PD requesting 20+ cameras --- a tactical misstep, because they'd been piloting a small number of cameras, and the larger request drove their acquisition costs across the threshold of needing board approval, which they were surprised to discover was contentious. Because the board was split on the prospect of giving OPPD a Village-wide "Google for all movements of any car everywhere" capability, we were able to extract concessions. We got board approval for a much-reduced deployment (I think we have 8 cameras), contingent on recommendations from our citizen police oversight and IT commissions (I'm on one of those). In the end, we got a General Order issued from OPPD limiting the use of cameras to violent crime, all uses traceable to case numbers reviewable by our police oversight commission, no usage from personal machines by OPPD staff but rather only OPPD-issued equipment, mandatory 2FA, and some other things I forget. We were much less successful at regulating data sharing. This is a huge feature of Flock, and part of its viral customer acquisition strategy. OPPD found out about Flock by getting access to data from neighboring municipalities; many police departments run "transparency portals" to show you who they're sharing with, and it's often "every law enforcement agency in the region". Which makes sense, if you look at it from the perspective of the police department! But it makes it much harder to regulate how cameras are used, because our PD can't issue General Orders for other PDs, and Flock doesn't appear to provide any tools to enforce limits on data sharing. The obvious thing to ask for in a pilot deployment is "turn all the sharing off", but that's hard when Flock's foot in the door was sharing from some other department. I'd have been happier if we'd ended up with zero Flock cameras, but I'm not sure how political realistic that would have been, and I'm surprised we were able to extract as many concessions as we did. Probably the most important thing we got was a commitment to a review of the effectiveness of the cameras after a year; presumably, if OPPD can't tie the cameras to solving specific violent crimes, we'll stop paying for the cameras. The Village Board didn't enjoy being blindsided by a random acquisition request, and demanded a process be put in place for future surveillance tech requests. So one happy side effect of this is that we teed up ACLU CCOPS†, which I expect to see passed in the next couple months. CCOPS theoretically prevents municipal agencies from deploying surveillance tech without board approval, even if the cost is below purchasing thresholds. Get involved in this stuff. You'd be surprised how little engagement there is at the local level, which is where a lot of the most important governing decisions are made. † https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/community-control-over-police-surveillance-ccops-model-bill https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/community-control-over-p...

drewda 4y ago

Los Altos Hills also recently installed Flock ALPRs. It's amusing how they allow residents to fill out a form on the town website to opt-out: https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/455/Automatic-License-Plate-Readers-ALPR https://www.losaltoshills.ca.gov/455/Automatic-License-Plate... In other words, you can opt-out of having your comings and goings monitored... as long as you own at least 1 acre of land (LAH's minimum lot size) in one of the top 10 wealthiest ZIP codes in the country.

jackson1442 4y ago
It seems like you can rent as well. I’m from Texas but my car is registered to my apartment’s address which seems like all they require. Would love to see better privacy legislation that would require an opt out for everyone though.
zbrozek 4y ago
The town installed it on a one-year trial basis. The cameras didn't break any cases and cost the town a huge amount of money to pay for police overtime to review all the footage. The city council voted unanimously to make them permanent, even in the face of clear evidence that they were useless. Why? To be seen to be doing something. They even said so in the resolution. Check out the staff report on page 335 of the agenda packet PDF. https://losaltoshillsca.portal.civicclerk.com/event/2742/files https://losaltoshillsca.portal.civicclerk.com/event/2742/fil... The final paragraphs before hitting boilerplate were especially galling: Even though residential burglaries are at an all-time high since the system was installed and no direct correlation can be made between the system and a reduction in residential burglaries, the cameras remain a tool that the Sheriff’s Office can use to help solve ongoing crime in Town and have been successful in solving other types of crimes. It is impossible to tell whether the presence of the cameras themselves could have deterred additional burglaries from happening, but in all, the cameras remain a reminder to the citizens of Los Altos Hills that the Town cares about their safety and that the Council is actively trying to reduce crime from occurring in Town.
- WillPostForFood 4y ago
  The cameras didn't break any cases That's not true, the page right before the one you quoted: During this evaluation period, a total of four suspects were arrested in two separate and ongoing investigations. Two were arrested for an armed robbery and carjacking that occurred in Cupertino and two were arrested while driving a stolen vehicle and committing various thefts in Town.

exabrial 4y ago

Illegal search. Why is this still a thing?

dhbanes 4y ago
How is this any more illegal than a cop calling in a license plate number of any random vehicle they see on the road (which is not at all illegal)?
- mixmastamyk 4y ago
  Automation changes the character of the policy and enforcement. This has been recognized before.
  - Kbelicius 4y ago
    GPs question still stands. Changing the character of policy and enforcement doesn't turn automatically reading license plates into illegal search. At least there isn't any obvious logical way to come to that conclusion. Do you care to point it out?
    - mixmastamyk 3y ago
      Appears you’ve read it as a defense, but comment was meant as a side point.
anigbrowl 4y ago
Nope, far from it.

thot_experiment 4y ago

This would be fine if all the data was public, that is the only way to make public surveillance systems do more harm than good.

JKCalhoun 4y ago
Maybe someone should assemble and open-source a license plate reader we can all carry — crowd-source pushing packets to a web site where cars + licenses are displayed on a map. It would more or less make the data egalitarian, make some kind of point maybe? I'm actually not averse to license plate readers. I'm not a privacy absolutist. I lean toward the privacy where you have the "expectation of privacy" but I could be convinced license plate readers cross that line.

egberts1 4y ago

The best license plate readers are the ones that not only optically lift those alphanumeric symbols off of either license plate but also does: 1. identify your car stereo bluetooth ID 2. any bluetooth devices on your vehicle 3. has direct access to national registry of stolen plates 4. and a mobile modem in which to send alerts with. 5. HD webcam auto-zooming to the driver's side of the vehicle. 6. lift On-Star ID Hey, what do I know? I'm just spitballing out there.

kevingadd 4y ago
Make sure to also identify all the passengers and any wireless devices they're carrying. You might catch a big crime network of people who hang out in their cars and talk about driving 7 mph over the limit on the highway while not wearing a seatbelt. You could build a big network of connections, maybe it would turn out that speeding is a social contagion and sending the worst speeders to a forced re-education program would deter the rest from speeding! /s
- egberts1 3y ago
  Like I said, this is just a spitball attempt to raise awareness of "license-plater readers" and something something about individual freedom.
tutorialmanager 3y ago
Don't forget to identify any political bumper stickers.
- egberts1 3y ago
  Wouldnt work in America, ya know, free speech and all. But the rest of the world, quite likely, even got support of GPRS or whatever it's called nowadays.

kyleblarson 4y ago

This is all moot until activist prosecutors and judges stop coddling criminals and start enforcing the rule of law.

electriclove 4y ago
Why the downvotes? Shouldn’t those committing armed robbery and property theft be punished?

megablast 4y ago

Good. Every car should be tracked. They are far too dangerous. Crazy we have so many rules for guns, but not cars. Guns have to be locked up, but not cars??

jfghi 4y ago

If these criminals are caught for thefts, should the wealthier jurisdictions also pay for their justice via taxes?

dhbanes 4y ago
Wealthier jurisdictions already do pay in the form of police expenditures. The vast majority of crime committed in wealthier jurisdictions is by people who do not live or pay taxes within the jurisdiction.

stevesearer 4y ago

We have ALPR in Santa Barbara at the city parking lots. These have 72-hour data retention and 30-day data retention at the airport and waterfront. While SB’s are not placed around the city to track all license plates like the ones in Palo Alto, Reifschneider’s statement of Palo Alto’s retention limits being “the shortest in the state” is not fully accurate. PDF: https://santabarbaraca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-06/Final%20City%20of%20Santa%20Barbara%20ALPR%20Policy.pdf https://santabarbaraca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-06/Final...

musicale 4y ago

Wow, this is sinister and really needs to stop.

jrockway 4y ago

> "We need to deter criminals from finding Palo Alto to be a nice, easy target," Burke said during Monday's hearing. "That needs to stop." This is like peak 2023. You create a little bubble where the cost to commit a crime increases slightly, so some percentage of criminals just go somewhere else, maybe even the next neighborhood over, where the risk is lower. Meanwhile, nobody is willing to fund the support services necessary to actually reduce the incentive to commit a crime, so crime numbers stay the same or go up, but they happen to someone else instead of you. Great stuff. If they install some spikes on their park benches homelessness will be solved too! And all with just a few dollars and a 1 hour board meeting. Incredible. Eventually everyone decides to play the arms race (but mom they have cameras the next town over) and we get the surveillance dystopia that nobody really wanted. Anyone who tries to fix it now has to face "but now randos are stealing muh catalytic converters" as an argument against taking down the cameras. And meanwhile, people still don't have food, shelter, medical care, or a support network. But we spent all that money. It just blows my mind and no I'm not going to run for office to fix it. Sorry.

voz_ 4y ago
> Eventually everyone decides to play the arms race If everyone plays the arms race, and its hard to commit crime anywhere, we win? This is fundamentally a good thing. "We" here being the hard working members of society that don't turn to crime, and would rather not be victims to it. It is very fashionable and woke to wax poetically about services, and yea, we have serious gaps there, but if someone is going to commit a crime, they should face the consequences.
- balls187 4y ago
  Catching criminals is a game of cat and mouse. I agree-face consequences. But, it just seems as though the public is tacitly trading in freedoms for security theater, with little real benefit to society.
  - KerrAvon 4y ago
    People really need to stop getting all of their societal knowledge from various iterations of Ocean’s 11.

Nifty3929 4y ago

I got a lot of pushback on a comment that I left regarding surveillance in another thread yesterday, but I feel especially vindicated by this so I'll repost it here: --- The main problem I see is that people are completely distracted by privacy from corporations - when what we really need to be worried about is privacy from our own governments. So much ink is spilled talking about cookies, ads tracking, etc. But really what's the worst a corporation is going to do? Try to sell you something? Meanwhile, we continue to allow our governments to regulate and legislate ever more intrusive invasions of our privacy. And they can put us in jail, or worse. This also gets blurry as governments take increasing control of companies, to the point that some are just about arms of the government, surveilling us in ways that the government can't (yet) do on their own - and being forced to pass that data to the government under penalty of law themselves. --- A lot of the pushback I got is that corporations can do bad things with your data, which of course is true. We should strive for privacy in the general sense, from corporations and our government. I just think, especially outside HN, that the the conversation is far too heavily weighted toward corporations when the far greater harm comes from our governments - and almost no time in general public media is given to this. I got some pushback as well that if corporations surveil you, they give your data to the government anyway, so it's important to have privacy from corporations. Which is ironic, since that's much like what I said in my last paragraph. We need privacy generally, but I see law after law and article after article talking about privacy from corporations, while our governments are gaining more and more ground into surveilling us - often with the help of corporations. But let's keep the focus on exactly how our governments are spying on us and try to address that. Ad-targeting is a small problem compared to the bigger issue of government surveillance - often via corporations (even if I agree that corporate spying is also a problem). Let's focus on some laws that take away the governments ability to demand our data from Google, FB, etc. Let's stop allowing our governments to put cameras all over the place. Let's demand that our intelligence agencies stop spying on us with wide nets. Let's stop allowing our police forces to buy sophisticated tracking software and phone break-in software.

LazyMans 3y ago

This may not have worked well for this specific PD for whatever reason, but Flock is already solving 5% of all US crime today. That’s pretty amazing.