alt Hacker News> The deputy then used the woman’s travel history in Flock as part of the justification for searching her car, where he allegedly discovered 91 pounds of meth.
That sentence does make this less of a win tbh, given that with it, it's just an actual example of the technology doing the job it is supposed to do.
Like this, it's almost a trojan horse of something pretending to be PR for A, but actually being effective PR for B.
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The point it's not just people with 91 pounds of meth who are getting tracked; it does what it's "supposed to" by treating everyone as a suspected criminal. An exterminator who blows up your house to get rid of termites still gets rid of the termites, but that doesn't make it a good solution.
I find it concerning that your recorded movements by mass surveillance devices can be used as justification subject you to a search.
91 pounds? That’s 2 million doses at 20 mg/dose [1].
I don't think rolling out mass surveillance to get some meth is a "win". How many innocent people were tracked by the same cameras used to track this single woman?
A major issue with surveillance tech like this is that it actually works.
It does what it's advertised to do: it lets the police track and catch criminals easier.
This is especially meaningful in cases of crimes where either the information availability or the effort of tracking the criminal down often make enforcement prohibitive.
If Flock had better PR people, they'd have no shortage of shoplifters, joyriders, car window smashers, porch poachers, carjackers and drug mules that were caught using their tech to parade around.
It's just that this benefit comes at the cost of privacy being diminished for everyone.