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Police Said They Surveilled Woman Who Had an Abortion for Her 'Safety.'
- locopati 1y agoTitle edited for length. Posting this because of the recent discussion about Flock technology. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45473698 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45473698
- chaps 1y agoA lot of folk tried to justify the situation as being not as bad as it sounded, citing the official narrative as a source of truth. It's amazing to me that people will still trust police narratives.
- collingreen 1y agoThe alternative is sometimes life shattering cognitive dissonance and then a constant feeling of dread. So much of the human condition is willful ignorance it's kind of amazing anything works.
- anonym29 1y agoIt's amazing to me that people who openly distrust obviously untrustworthy US police departments continue to trust the US federal government.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- Zigurd 1y agoDistrust isn't a single thing. Distrusting cops is an entirely different kind of distrust than distrusting RFK Jr. RFK Jr kills people with pseudoscience. Cops go hands-on. I don't know enough about the statistics to compare the magnitude of killing. But I do know that the solutions would have to be completely different.
- locopati 1y agoThere's a difference between trusting cops, trusting the high-level branches of the US Government, and trusting the various departments of the US bureaucracy. For example, I trust NOAA or NASA, used to trust the CDC, would never trust the CIA or FBI (because cops).
- chipsrafferty 1y agoWhy no longer trust CDC?
- queenkjuul 1y agoBobby K
- locopati 1y agoI'm sure the employees are doing their jobs to the best of their abilities. but i doubt the administration is going to be truthful about any disease outbreaks. and they're already pushing anti-vax nonsense.
- masfuerte 1y agoIt's the same in the UK. I first became aware of it after the Jean Charles de Menezes shooting. He was the innocent electrician shot in 2005 as part of a terrorism panic. Every detail released by the police to justify the killing turned out to be a lie. Having paid attention since then I've come to realise it is standard practice. Police behaviour in public inquiries (usually stonewalling and obfuscating) has been so bad that the government has just passed a law placing a "duty of candour" on the police and other civil servants, with criminal penalties for serious breaches. That was less than a month ago so we'll see how it works.
- dghlsakjg 1y agoLying in an official statement is already an illegal act punishable by jail (Perjury act of 1911). Don't hold your breath.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- rcxdude 1y agoDuty of Candour is a lot stronger than perjury. You can obstruct an investigation in all kinds of ways without perjuring yourself (especially since the standard of evidence is quite high). Duty of Candour basically makes any kind of obstruction an offense.
- chaps 1y agoYeah. And lying cops still testify despite.. systems.. inplace to prevent that sort of thing: https://chicagoreader.com/news/police-misconduct-brady/ https://chicagoreader.com/news/police-misconduct-brady/ (disclaimer, I'm one of the authors)
- hylaride 1y agoSimilar story with the infamous NYC case of Kitty Genovese in the mid 1960s, whom was sexually assaulted and murdered. The police claimed dozens of people heard and saw her screams, but nobody did anything. The truth was many people called the police, but nobody came. It was an essentially a coverup, but it did end up becoming a symbol of NYC’s moral decay. The narrative wasn’t officially challenged until many years later. (There is a recent is documentary out there where her brother digs into it all).
- potato3732842 1y ago>It's amazing to me that people will still trust police narratives. I wouldn't care if they were at least consistent. What I take issue with is that the same individuals will toss the official narrative if it contradicts their viewpoint. That is a personal moral failing.
- titzer 1y agoThe Orwellian doublespeak is just a sign of the requisite cognitive dissonance surfacing whenever it conflicts with the necessity of maintaining in-group/out-group dynamics.
- hughieloseit 1y agoThe majority of the global population still abides faith based story mode narratives. American conviction in religion has fallen ~20% since 2000 but that still leaves ~60% bought into skywizards as media owned by older more religious intentionally helps peddle Newspeak that obfuscates attempts to bring science to the masses.
- terminalshort 1y agoConviction in religion has fallen 0%. It's just that the new religion doesn't call itself a religion.
- mulmen 1y agoWhat’s the new religion?
- terminalshort 1y agoMostly seems to be political views.
- mulmen 1y agoPolitical views are not new. What made them religions recently?
- terminalshort 1y agoIDK, you'd have to ask the people that treat politics like their religion these days. They're everywhere. Doubt it would help, though, because those people will never admit to it being their religion even though it very obviously is.
- danaris 1y agoAnd maybe this has something to do with your personal definition of religion not matching the one that the rest of the world is operating under. "This is something I believe in firmly and will defend my belief in" is not what makes something a religion. Real religions have tenets, rituals, and beliefs beyond things like "people deserve to be treated well".
- josefritzishere 1y agoYou cannot charge people for a crime... for their safety. These ideas are mutually excusive.
- mcherm 1y agoAttempted suicide is criminalized in some jurisdictions for exactly that reason.
- barbazoo 1y agoWhich ones? I couldn't find anything supporting that claim but I'm not an expert.
- PokemonNoGo 1y agoNot the person you asked but Kenya is one... But I doubt they use Flock (yet).
- bongodongobob 1y agoInvoluntary mental health holds are a thing, but it's not an offense. You will get a bill though.
- Jtsummers 1y ago> Attempted suicide is criminalized in some jurisdictions for exactly that reason. Ah yes, let's protect a suicidal person by charging them with a crime which they may eventually be able to expunge, but in the meantime will effect their livelihood. That will surely not create any problems which might complicate their lives and drive them further towards suicidal behavior. That makes perfect sense.
- prismatk 1y agoIt's my understanding that this is a crime that is never charged or prosecuted. Rather, if (attempted) suicide is a crime, it serves as a legal fiction that provides a structure for first responders to intervene. Police can then enter an office where someone is hanging out a window without a warrant, for example, because there are exigent circumstances (a crime in progress). Officers could also physical restrain someone trying to jump from a bridge and have a more straightforward justification for this after the fact. I think this is a societal good. Have you seen any examples of suicidal people being charged or prosecuted for attempted suicide? I can imagine that this could have opportunities for abuse, but not ones that are qualitatively different from probable cause writ large.
- Jtsummers 1y ago> “As much as Flock tries to be good stewards of the powerful tech we sell, this shows it really is up to users to serve their communities in good faith. Selling to law-enforcement is tricky because we assume they will use our tech to do good and then just have to hope we're right.” > The Flock source added “Even if Flock took a stance on permitted use-cases, a motivated user could simply lie about why they're performing a search. We can never 100% know how or why our tools are being used.” A second Flock source said they believe Flock should develop a better idea of what its clients are using the company’s technology for. In other words, why bother with safeguards when they'll just lie to us anyways?
- mcherm 1y agoThere are ways to work around that problem. For instance, just making it a rule that they are not allowed to lie to you about how things are being used -- we know that won't work because if they're willing to lie they are also willing to ignore contract violations. Instead, put in a rule that says misuse of the system costs $X for each documented case. Now the vendor has a financial incentive to detect misuse, and the purchasers have a FINANCIAL incentive to curb misuse by their own employees. It's not a magic fix, but it's the sort of thing that might help.
- colechristensen 1y agoBetter: require them to purchase misuse violation insurance. Make a neutral third party liable for the cost and then that third party which is mostly disinterested gets to calculate risk and compliance procedures. The only way we're really going to get data handling under control is to give the victims of data abuse financial beneficiaries of liability through the courts and insurance companies.
- jasonjayr 1y ago... a neutral third party where the some of the board of directors have a seat at the camera company, or city concil seat? This all ends in corporate feudalism, doesn't it?
- jofer 1y agoFlock really does have a huge amount of potential for abuse. It's a fair point that private companies (e.g. Google, etc) have way more surveillance on us than the government does, but the US and local governments having this level of surveillance should also worry folks. There's massive potential for abuse. And frankly, I don't trust most local police departments to not have someone that would use this to stalk their ex or use it in other abusive ways. I weirdly actually trust Google's interests in surveillance (i.e. marketing) more than I trust the government's legitimate need to monitor in some cases to track crimes. Things get scary quick when mass surveillance is combined with (often selective) prosecution.
- ptaffs 1y agoyou, maybe politely, imply the police might abuse these tools, rather than actually they do routinely abuse the tools. For instance, one recent case which isn't speculation: https://local12.com/news/nation-world/police-chief-gets-caught-using-license-plate-cameras-to-track-his-ex-girlfriend-228-times-arrests-charges-probation-flock-safety-follow-stalk-new-boyfriend-broke-up-out-of-town-misuse https://local12.com/news/nation-world/police-chief-gets-caug...
- pavel_lishin 1y agoYeah; I don't exactly trust Google with tracking data, but at least Google doesn't have the power to imprison or kill me on a whim.
- terminalshort 1y agoProblem is that if Google has it, the government can get it.
- dfxm12 1y agoThe thing is though, cops harass people, cops abuse their power, courts prosecute who they want, with or without Flock. This is a valid concern, but the root of the issue, I think what we should focus on first or primarily, is that the justice system isn't necessarily accountable for mistakes or corruption. As long as qualified immunity exists, as long as things like the "Kids for Cash" scandal (which didn't need Flock) go on, it doesn't really matter what tools they have, or not.
- bjourne 1y agoI think bored cops are a much bigger threat to Democracy than most crime. It's ironic that the less crime and the more efficient policing the less free we become.
- OutOfHere 1y agoIndeed. I think people have been paying too much in taxes. Once tax revenue is diminished, all of this wasteful liberty-harming spending is supposed to correct itself. Regular workers don't have much of a choice in how much they pay, but businesses do.
- mothballed 1y agoGot to get rid of frivolous seizures/fines too. Back in the '09 crash police in my state were ticketing people like crazy, for even the tiniest infraction, due to reduced tax revenues. They'll never willingly give up their salaries so long as a single route is left for them to suck up the cash.
- OutOfHere 1y agoQuite true. Do you have any solutions that come to mind? I sold my car and have been at peace ever since. No more tickets. Believe it or not, but even when I lived in the distant suburbs, it was generally feasible to bike to the office, particularly if one lives very near to work. Now I live in more crowded suburbs where I can rely on Uber/Lyft or public transportation. If I had to purchase a means to transportation, it's most likely to be an ebike, potentially even a three-wheeled one. The main time when they aren't good enough is in deep winter when the temperature is about 10F or less. Always wear a helmet and highly reflective clothing when on these things, and mind the speed.
- vkou 1y ago> Indeed. I think people have been paying too much in taxes. Once tax revenue is diminished, all of this wasteful liberty-harming spending is supposed to correct itself. My friend, the only thing that's going to diminish is public services that actually help people. The police state is the primary state organ dedicated to protecting people with political power from the hoi polloi, it's the one thing that's never going to go away. If the past few thousand years of history is any indication, these people will wring every last cent out of you to pay a professional warrior class that will protect them from you.
- IncreasePosts 1y agohttps://archive.is/cN8fX https://archive.is/cN8fX
- goda90 1y agohttps://deflock.me https://deflock.me
- anonym29 1y agoIronic that a site offering anti-surveillance resources is itself hosted behind the servers of Cloudflare, a US-based company (read: must turn over all data to NSA whenever they receive a national security letter, if they're not already eagerly, voluntarily turning over that data) that MiTM's a substantial portion of all global internet traffic.
- aeon_ai 1y agoWe can entirely write off every US-based company as inherently evil simply because they're American. Or, you know, we could operate with an ounce of nuance and not oversimplify the complexities of the world we live in.
- anonym29 1y agoMost US-based companies aren't conducting MITM attacks that capture plaintext traffic for something like 20% of all global internet traffic. Accordingly, most US-based companies are not in a position for bulk data collection and assisting the totalitarian surveillance state. Cloudflare, however, is, and does. They are not a trustworthy party here, no more so than Flock itself.
- aeon_ai 1y agoMITM attack is a disingenuous label applied to a completely voluntary service that the site you're visiting opts into. Why? Because, for many, it's a technical necessity to protect sites from the dark forest of the web (i.e., assholes.) You can cast aspersions on the implications of that in conjunction with US intelligence access, but you're painting a completely fabricated picture of reality that borders on delusional.
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- sema4hacker 1y agoWhen you put tools like databases or surveillance cameras into the hands of people, two things are guaranteed: a certain number of those people will use the tools for the wrong purpose, and a certain number of those bad users will lie about it.
- a456463 1y agoAny time some body says it is for your safety, it is not. Google, Apple, and police too.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago> Any time some body says it is for your safety, it is not You fasten your seatbelt in a car and plane for your own (and others’) safety. Not because everything is a conspiracy.
- bananapub 1y agoI have thought about this thing Bruce Schneier said in 2009[0] a lot, ever since I first read it: > It’s bad civic hygiene to build technologies that could someday be used to facilitate a police state. 0: https://www.schneier.com/essays/archives/2009/07/technology_shouldnt.html https://www.schneier.com/essays/archives/2009/07/technology_...
- SteveDavis88 1y agohttps://archive.is/cN8fX https://archive.is/cN8fX
- evardlo 1y agoDoes Flock offer any on-premise solution that would prevent the data from moving across state lines?
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago> Does Flock offer any on-premise solution that would prevent the data from moving across state lines? Flock does not have an ALPR monopoly.
- runako 1y agoHuge disconnect between these narratives: - Crime is out of control, requiring deployment of active duty military to multiple cities. - Police are so bored they are sifting through security cameras on fishing expeditions to maybe find someone accessing medical care.
- RandomBacon 1y agoThose are not mutually exclusive.
- Forgeties79 1y agoI’m not sure that I buy that argument but either way the data clearly shows crime has fallen consistently over the decades. Even over the last couple of years. This narrative that cities (of course only Democrat-dominated cities) are so crime ridden that they are basically under siege is completely manufactured. The governor of my state went out of his way to ask Trump to come crack down on a few cities (all overwhelmingly or somewhat leaning blue) despite drastic drops in crime rates over the last five years. Ignoring the fact that he is the governor and has a super majority Republican legislature, meaning that ultimately he is saying “daddy Trump come save me I can’t do my job uwu,” he also very conspicuously left his home city off the list despite it sharing a similar population size and crime rate as another major city on the list. It’s all a sham. The data does not bear their message out.
- mrguyorama 1y agoThere actually doesn't have to be a disconnect between the narratives. It could be possible that crime is out of control because police are doing these things instead of their actual job. Compare the efforts police will go through to play with their toys vs the efforts they will go through to actually solve crime. Despite living in a literal panopticon where the cops can buy infinite tracking information on anyone and even on just a query, violent crime clearance rates are abysmal. Police just don't do their jobs. edit: I do not actually believe crime is out of control, because it is not. I believe that cops are bad actors and liars.
- Razengan 1y agoGotta keep the supply of slaves coming. Why don't they just grow humans in vats?
- silexia 1y ago[flagged]
- kccoder 1y agoNot everyone agrees with you.
- fknorangesite 1y agoI hope, then, that you advocate for policies that actually reduce abortions, rather than attempting to ban them outright.
- jenadine 1y agoThere are many exceptions for which killing doesn't make it a murder.
- IX-103 1y agoStalk one person and they get a restraining order. Stalk the entire town and it's a profitable business.
- AcerbicZero 1y agoProbably time to reinvent the license plate as a concept; or start spinning up LLC's to put the cars under and just each the extra insurance costs.
- ryandvm 1y agoI feel like this would be a good use of "provocative compliance". 1. Create an open network of off-the-shelf cameras watching public roadways 2. Load up the database with license plate numbers of local politicians and/or law enforcement 3. Create a "Where is my senator?" web site that uses that data 4. Watch all hell break loose 5. Get distributed stalking without a warrant outlawed
- NewJazz 1y agoThere are laws that protect legislators from this sort of thing (but not everyone else). See the recent spat between Senators Wyden and Cruz.
- sys_64738 1y agoAs soon as I saw the headline then I just knew this would be a TX based police force.
- IT4MD 1y agoI would speak on this topic, but its political and Dang will have a moment, so I guess we'll just keep talking around the topic and never touching the cause. Neat!