

Big brother: UK camera grid to track cars via license plates - pmikal
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetools/print/news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/whos_watching_you/8064333.stm

======
blhack
We already do this in Arizona.

Guys...1984 was a WARNING, not a set of _instructions_.

~~~
systemtrigger
I live in Phoenix and you're right, some of these cameras are set up to photo
every license plate that passes regardless of whether the box detected a
traffic violation. It's billed as an Amber Alert mechanism so when authorities
identify a suspect they plug in his license plate and every camera sniffs
every vehicle. The problem is the organizations involved have been very dodgy
about revealing the scope and logging details. So we're left to wonder if in
addition to catching bad guys Big Brother is tracking innocent non-suspects.
I'm not convinced they are and it's not necessarily bad if they did but given
the track record of our government the past 8 years we should probably demand
transparency.

Originally we were told all these boxes did was equitably enforce speed and
red-light laws efficiently at a great profit over human officers. But now it's
turning into "Oh and by the way we'll be photographing the innocent non-
violators too." Maybe we need an outside group of hackers to act in an
oversight capacity. Or maybe we should just design that license plate
switching feature from Knight Rider so if you do speed you're giving someone
else a ticket. (Note to Sherriff Joe: I'm just kidding.)

I am reminded of that scene in the movie Brazil when a bug literally falls
into a government computer, the suspect's name gets misspelled and an innocent
person is punished for what another (innocent) person did. I just hope the two
Phoenix based companies working on this camera technology, Redflex and
American Traffic Systems, operate on a higher set of principles than GoDaddy
headquarters which is just down the street and given its turnover possibly a
significant source of traffic company employees.

------
robgough
Thanks to the amount of science fiction on exactly this topic, it's like we
can see our future - but we're choosing to ignore it. What they're trying to
do, they're doing for "good" reasons - of that I'm sure. It's just that they
don't understand the larger consequences, none of us do. And we (the general
population) will continue to not understand until it is ultimately too late.

------
zandorg
I have developed license plate-reading technology which can use a modern
digital camera. Just put the technology in the hands of the masses and we can
track our own cars.

~~~
bmelton
Would you be willing to provide more information regarding this?

~~~
zandorg
Not currently. It's in an early alpha version which doesn't work all the time,
and I haven't touched the codebase in a couple of years. I'll post to HN when
I've checked it out.

It rips text from images so OCR can be more accurate. For some reason, it's
working on normal text, but not number plates right now...

------
dschobel
I'm wondering when we're going to see the corresponding drop in punishment
severity as the deterrence portion of the equation approaches nil.

