

U.S. Authorities Are Reportedly Gathering Data Using Fake Celltowers on Planes - riaface
http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/13/u-s-authorities-are-reportedly-gathering-phone-data-using-fake-celltowers-on-planes/

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swartkrans
> As ever, responses to this news will largely fall into two categorizes:
> those who believe that the U.S. — and other governments — should do
> everything within its power to find and apprehend criminals; and those who
> feel that the government is again running roughshod over privacy rights.

This is a false dichotomy. If you care about apprehending criminals actually
responsible for crimes you should care about this too. A reoccurring subtext
is that law enforcement cares more about quantity than quality, but data
quality is hugely important. These dragnets are the equivalent of a House TV
Series body scan, and the arguments that characters in the show made apply
here.

One of the consequences of a dragnet and too much low quality data is the risk
of circumstantial evidence leading to the conviction of the wrong individual.
The minds of investigators and district attorneys are susceptible to all the
biases that plague any other field including confirmation bias. Project
Innocence has revealed heaps of wrongful convictions based on low quality
data, even when police corruption wasn't at fault. Dennis Fritz and Ron
Williamson for example were convicted for murder based solely on bad
circumstantial evidence while the real perpetrator remained unpunished for
over a decade.

It's not just privacy advocates who should care about stopping these kinds of
surveillance techniques. That is unless the dragnet apologists don't care
about who is being punished for crimes just as long someone is punished
whether or not they actually committed a crime.

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CWuestefeld
You're right, it is a false choice. But before we get to discussing that, we
should first be considering whether there's a choice that needs to be made at
all.

I personally am far from convinced that law enforcement has a significant
problem with locating fugitives. I may be wrong with this, but I haven't seen
anything concrete to dissuade me from those views. How often are such location
services actually needed, and what are the consequences of not having them
available?

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sixothree
I don't understand how if these technologies are being used to convict people
in open court how are we just learning about them now through leaks?

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nraynaud
I'm such a bad vilain: I had this idea only 4-5months ago and I didn't act on
it. They built it way before I had the idea.

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ableal
_" allow them to prize registration and identification information from a
‘target’"_

Tripped up on this phrase; dusting myself off, I believe the writer meant
"pry".

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janzer
Although rather uncommon prize can also mean "the act of seizing; capture".

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CalRobert
Is that not prise?

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rdl
UK prise, US prize

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ableal
Thanks, I had a nagging feeling I was missing something. I would have
recognized the British spelling ...

