alt Hacker NewsPrivate citizens filming in public and police forces setting up arrays of surveillance cameras in public somehow don’t seem equivalent. I’m not a lawyer so I can’t properly articulate what the legal difference is. And if there isn’t one then the law needs change. Clearly the majority of citizens agree with me.
Is it legal for US citizens to all put cameras on their cars and set up a network where we can all see where all police are at any given time?
Seems like a good idea at this point.
Replies
> Is it legal for US citizens to all put cameras on their cars and set up a network where we can all see where all police are at any given time?
Sure. There's absolutely nothing illegal about monitoring the location and activity of police (unless you broke some other law to do so, like hacking).
Hell, most of them will simply tell you where they are and what they're doing, as they tend to broadcast over unencrypted radio (which is also not illegal to listen to).
> Private citizens filming in public and police forces setting up arrays of surveillance cameras in public somehow don’t seem equivalent.
The reason these strategies (for the same goal) don't seem equivalent is due to the nature of oversight. Flock as a centralized private company governed by a procedural system, can be corrupted and abused more easily than a distributed network. Flock's systems have already been abused and will continue to be.
Re Title: Flock doesn't "want" anything in particular, other than to sell more contracts and make more money.
The quickest way to get dragnet surveillance banned would be for citizens to collaborate and create a massive publicly-available surveillance network.
already happening and it seems it is legal https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/citizens-are-tracki...
Yes, it's different. It's a legal doctrine called mosaic theory.
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