4 ms·

I’m not in favor of predictive policing. It’s not illegal to be suspicious. So I can’t get on board with this program. But I am a huge fan of speed cameras fro

I’m not in favor of predictive policing. It’s not illegal to be suspicious. So I can’t get on board with this program. But I am a huge fan of speed cameras from a public safety perspective. Excessive speed is a huge contributing factor in accidents yet I rarely see it enforced. There’s no point in having a law if it’s only going to be enforced against the poor or minorities. I don’t see it as a privacy violation since any person can plainly see you’re speeding. I’m also in favor of more cameras to catch criminals. The first order effect of this is immediate: fewer criminals are around to crime. The second order effect is that fewer crimes will be attempted as the chance of being caught and punished approaches 1. This actually decreases the amount of police work that has to be done. Having cameras is effectively the same as having a police officer. Except cameras don’t shoot people, and footage is a lot more reliable than sworn testimony.

Incipient 3y ago
>Except cameras don’t shoot people Obvious photography jokes aside, this seems like a case of bad police training, or excessive guns in the US causing police to need to 'shoot before being shot'. If someone is looking a bit dodgy standing outside a kindergarten, I'd absolutely want "predictive policing" to go have a chat to the guy. May just be a case of someone excessively caffeinated waiting for their kid, in which case no foul. However the appearance of the police keeping on top of things deters others from committing actual crimes. I'd rather police prevent abductions than solve them.
vogon_laureate 3y ago
I live in the UK with a high use of cameras for everything. For speed it clearly works where there is an actual camera (it works less well between cameras). For crime there’s some evidence it might have a deterrent effect on property crime and drug crime. There is very little evidence to show that it has had any effect on violent crime, public disorder offences, and the like. There’s also an argument that over-reliance on cctv has reduced the kind of policing people most favour – community policing. The government has recently banned Hikvision cameras (one of the most ubiquitous brands) from its buildings over concerns about the Chinese company’s use of data and their role in the oppression of Uyghur Muslims in Chinese state run “re-education camps”. Cameras can be useful in certain circumstances, but their efficacy is often overstated, and there are many downsides.

Incipient 3y ago

>Except cameras don’t shoot people Obvious photography jokes aside, this seems like a case of bad police training, or excessive guns in the US causing police to need to 'shoot before being shot'. If someone is looking a bit dodgy standing outside a kindergarten, I'd absolutely want "predictive policing" to go have a chat to the guy. May just be a case of someone excessively caffeinated waiting for their kid, in which case no foul. However the appearance of the police keeping on top of things deters others from committing actual crimes. I'd rather police prevent abductions than solve them.

vogon_laureate 3y ago

I live in the UK with a high use of cameras for everything. For speed it clearly works where there is an actual camera (it works less well between cameras). For crime there’s some evidence it might have a deterrent effect on property crime and drug crime. There is very little evidence to show that it has had any effect on violent crime, public disorder offences, and the like. There’s also an argument that over-reliance on cctv has reduced the kind of policing people most favour – community policing. The government has recently banned Hikvision cameras (one of the most ubiquitous brands) from its buildings over concerns about the Chinese company’s use of data and their role in the oppression of Uyghur Muslims in Chinese state run “re-education camps”. Cameras can be useful in certain circumstances, but their efficacy is often overstated, and there are many downsides.