
Secret Cameras Record Baltimore’s Every Move from Above - coloneltcb
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-baltimore-secret-surveillance/
======
zaroth
Still waiting for the blockbuster case where the all-seeing-eye saved the day?
At some level this is being sold to the public. Are we getting what we paid
for?

This technology should be nothing if not incredibly useful. The potential of
abuse is so bad _because_ it's so damn useful. So, if it's inevitable that
it's going to be created, and inevitable that it's going to be abuse, can we
at least try to ensure we use it for good as much as possible?

~~~
ISL
An all-seeing eye is perhaps too apropos....

'You are wise and powerful. Will you not take the Ring?’

'No!' cried Gandalf, springing to his feet. 'With that power I should have
power too great and terrible. And over me the Ring would gain a power still
greater and more deadly.' His eyes flashed and his face was lit as by a fire
within. 'Do not tempt me! For I do not wish to become like the Dark Lord
himself. Yet the way of the Ring to my heart is by pity, pity for weakness and
the desire of strength to do good. Do not tempt me! I dare not take it, not
even to keep it safe, unused. The wish to wield it would be too great for my
strength. I shall have such need of it. Great perils lie before me.'

~~~
reddytowns
Here is another opinion on the matter, probably closer to how politicians
would feel about it

‘And what business is it of yours, anyway, to know what I do with my own
things? It is my own. I found it. It came to me. It is mine, I tell you. My
own. My Precious. Yes, my Precious.’

\--Bilbo Baggins

------
graedus
This appears to be the FBI surveillance plane John Wiseman tracked using a
BeagleBone black, an RTL-SDR dongle, dump1090 and PlanePlotter

[https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/605825895295651840](https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/605825895295651840)

[http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/06/how-i-tracked-
fbi...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/06/how-i-tracked-fbi-aerial-
surveillance/)

Correction: The FBI plane is not the primary focus of this article, but it is
mentioned:

"Occasionally, [Persistent Surveillance's] Cessna has had to share airspace
with an FBI airplane. Last year, two days after the Freddie Gray riots began,
the FBI flew over Baltimore for five days—actions that were discovered when
local aviation enthusiasts noticed a plane’s strange flight orbits on a public
website that tracks radar data. According to information and footage released
this summer by the FBI, its plane wasn’t doing the sort of wide-area motion
imaging that Persistent Surveillance does but instead was zooming in on
specific targets. McNutt says the FBI doesn’t coordinate its flights with him,
and he doesn’t know what the agency is investigating; however, when his plane
is in the air at the same time as the FBI’s, air traffic controllers insist
that McNutt’s plane remain at a lower altitude than the federal craft."

~~~
nyqstna
It's interesting to note that FBI has released all of that footage to the
public.

[https://vault.fbi.gov/protests-in-baltimore-
maryland-2015/un...](https://vault.fbi.gov/protests-in-baltimore-
maryland-2015/unedited-versions-of-video-surveillance-footage)

------
cypherpunks01
Is there any remote hope for a way to have this happen while preventing abuse?
I am not in a very creative mood right now so I can't imagine a scenario where
it's not quickly being used incredibly selectively (to "just contradict
anything that might be used against the City of Baltimore"), or used to
catalog protesters, bulk shipped to the nsa, or many other obvious forms of
abuse.

Edit: and of course, where is the countersurveillance guide that examines easy
techniques to evade a persistent and widespread aerial threat?

~~~
cgearhart
I'd go the other way -- is there any remote hope of stopping this from
spreading, regardless of abuses? History has shown that on a long enough time
line this _will_ be abused. Under what authority do they operate these
systems? Since when has persistent surveillance become permissible?

I feel like I'm going to end up a minority here, but _this is not a good
thing_.

~~~
yitchelle
The potential of abusive use of technology is there for every single new
technology, every single one. The question is how to best control it with
somebody we can trust, and the use case is morally OK.

------
rizumu
>“Let’s go get some dirt bikes, Sarge!”

To better understand this reaction and why the police want to use this
technology to their advantage in winning the cat-and-mouse game with
Baltimore's urban dirt bikers, see the documentary film "12 O'clock Boys".

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOMQY6k16TU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOMQY6k16TU)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12_O'Clock_Boys](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12_O'Clock_Boys)

------
athenot
There's an easy way to prevent abuse: require the data to be made available to
the public in real time. It's not surveillance I object to, it's the coupling
of information asymmetry with unaccountability.

Maybe when people start flying their own drones and the data gets aggregated
into OpenStreetMap (or some similar project), there will be a decent
motivation for transparency.

After all, if the police forces are doing nothing wrong, what do they have to
fear from continual public surveillance? ;)

------
WestCoastJustin
Seems there are many variants of this type of tech. PBS [1 - video] had once
called AGRUS [2 - wiki] (looks older 2013 and more advanced). They also
deployed something like this in Rio for the Olympics [3 - blog/video].

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13BahrdkMU8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13BahrdkMU8)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARGUS-
IS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARGUS-IS)

[3] [http://www.sporttechie.com/2016/08/01/surveillance-blimps-
to...](http://www.sporttechie.com/2016/08/01/surveillance-blimps-to-provide-
an-eye-in-the-sky-for-rio-olympics/)

------
RobertoG
"[..] and the funding came from a private donor."

That it's interesting.

Is just somebody with interest in the company that provide the service, in the
line of "the first one is for free"?

Because, otherwise, I can't think who could be funding this or their reasons.

~~~
koffiezet
If you would have read the article:

> John is a former Enron trader whose hedge fund, Centaurus Advisors, made
> billions before he retired in 2012. Since then, the Arnolds have funded a
> variety of hot-button causes, including advocating for public pension
> rollbacks and charter schools.

Doesn't sound like a pro-privacy activist...

~~~
r_smart
>Doesn't sound like a pro-privacy activist...

Well, funding putting cameras in the sky supports that certainly, but what do
pensions and charter schools have to do with privacy?

------
gilgongo
I'm fine with this because all the data is encrypted until representatives
from all three branches of government agree to unlock it (and even then it
only decrypts the last 7 days).

Oh, wait.

------
cypherpunks01
Explanation given for why this is not a threat to civil liberties is:

resolution is limited to " _one pixel per person_ "!

~~~
ctack
It's a foot in the door.

~~~
rainforest
1px is all you need: the article cites instances where they track a pixel to a
ground-based camera to get a higher res image.

------
tramov
Its been a long time, but in 1988 Sierra Online had a game that featured just
this.

Tracking "criminals" from above, following the signal from their implants and
their every move until they disappeared underground.

[https://www.mobygames.com/game/manhunter-new-
york](https://www.mobygames.com/game/manhunter-new-york)

------
annnnd
I am as concerned about privacy as next person, but I would have thought that
this is similar to what the satellites are already collecting for NSA, CIA and
similar (and their counterparts in other countries).

Is flying Cessna planes really the optimal way of obtaining images? Why not
drones (if you can't get satellites)? Or is this just MVP with room for
optimization?

~~~
revelation
NSA, CIA and all their friends exist for the sole reason that they can't spy
on Americans. That's why they exist, because the constitution doesn't apply to
foreigners. They would be a walking terrorist organisation otherwise.

So your question becomes "why can't the police do what the intelligence
services already do?" and the obvious answer is that "because then they stop
being police and are instead secret police or Gestapo".

~~~
alanwatts
>NSA, CIA and all their friends exist for the sole reason that they can't spy
on Americans.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr.#NSA_mon...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr.#NSA_monitoring_of_King.27s_communications)

~~~
revelation
Theres the legal theory and then there is the 100 years worth of experience
with intelligence agencies, which is that they are mostly useless and will
over time expand their influence and power and dig under the pillars of
democracy.

------
SubiculumCode
This ain't your Daddy's 'The Wire' IRL.

------
nyqstna
Is this really a surprise? PSS activity has been documented for years.[0]

Good rule of thumb: If it's not illegal, people will do it if it is
profitable.

[0][http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/07/a-tivo-for-
crime-...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/07/a-tivo-for-crime-how-
always-recording-airborne-cameras-watch-entire-cities/)

~~~
cypherpunks01
I don't see anyone claiming to be surprised the technology exists, the notable
thing is the update on the deployment progression of WAPS systems on civilian
populations in the US.

I believe the newsworthy thing here is that the system has been in active use
in Baltimore for the entire year 2016 so far, which is a surprise, in contrast
to the 2014 article you linked that reported the company had "no active
contracts inside the United States".

~~~
nyqstna
It also says:

"[McNutt] is lobbying 10 US cities—he won’t name them, apart from Chicago—for
longer contracts. He’s also dangling a sizable carrot in front of them: a new
analysis center that would have “hundreds” of jobs and would act as a command
center for all of the company’s operations nationwide."

Obviously one of those was Baltimore. Is it a leap to think that there may be
others? Not to be crass, but this isn't gumshoe detective work here. He told
us what his company was doing.

------
ctack
In light of Snowden leaks, this is just another piece in what appears to be a
global panopticon construction project.

~~~
ddt_Osprey
There's worse things than Snowden's revelations though, like cheerfully
donating your organs to a government that executes you over some religious
aerobics classes. [1]

I hope this whole panopticon thing doesn't get finished until after we can
grow organs in vitro, rendering my donations moot.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_harvesting_from_Falun_Go...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_harvesting_from_Falun_Gong_practitioners_in_China)

~~~
ctack
I don't understand what you're saying here. I don't see the connection between
organ harvesting and the construction of a global panopticon.

You also seem to be supporter of such a panopticon. Could you explain why? Or
are you just trolling?

~~~
throwanem
He's saying, I think, that it's worth keeping a sense of perspective - that
there are much worse things than being watched. He's not wrong there.

~~~
alanwatts
Comparing to the lowest common denominator to feel better about something is
often akin to denial.

~~~
throwanem
No doubt. But I've had a while to consider this possibility, having noticed
general aviation aircraft loitering over Baltimore for some time now and half
surmised something like this may be going on, and you know what? I'm fine with
it. Being watched from the sky is hardly ideal, I concede. But also worth
considering, I think, is that the next time I get mugged, if there has to be a
next time, maybe being watched from the sky will make it possible for the
police to catch the son of a bitch who does it.

That's one of the things that can happen in Baltimore. It is far from the
worst. Indeed, it, and things much worse, happen in Baltimore every day. Don't
misunderstand me here - media depictions aside, this is a wonderful city with
which I fell in love very quickly, and where I expect and intend to continue
living for the remainder of my life. But this is also a city, wonderful though
it be in many ways, in which many bad things happen to many innocent people.
Being observed from on high by our government bears a certain degree of
potential danger, of course. There's an argument to be made, and I think a
very cogent one, that that potential danger is outweighed by the very real
danger evident in this city's crime statistics. I'm okay with being watched
from the sky if it is likely to reduce that danger, and I think that it is.

I realize that people who have never been the victim of a violent crime may
feel differently about this. I understand that their perspective on a matter
such as this may well be different from mine. I also don't think it is
unreasonable of me to regard their perspective as incompletely informed.
Basing an argument around my personal experience is not something with which
I'm wholly comfortable for a variety of reasons, not least of which is that
it's often deployed as a tactic against dissent. But there's also something to
be said for the idea that there's only so much a virgin can be expected to
know about sex. I don't really know if it's reasonable to expect there be a
single right answer on a question like this one. But I certainly know where I
come down on it.

~~~
ctack
I'm sorry to hear about your experiences and thank-you for being straight up.

First of all, I don't know your experiences and am in no way trying to cheapen
them, but I too have been the victim of crime (a break in while I was sleeping
and I woke up and screamed and woke up the house and assailants thankfully
fled) and lots of treasured possessions were taken. If I'd been asked in the
first year of that, I'd have let the government put cameras in my bathroom and
the death penalty would not be enough for them. But of course as things have
cooled off; I've moved on and found peace. And now the idea of giving away
completely the right to private movement in the name of safety seems plain
wrong.

~~~
throwanem
Certainly that's fair enough. As I said before, I don't know that it makes
sense to expect there be a single right answer to a question like this.

Your response neatly demonstrates the other primary reason I do not like to
construct an argument around personal experience. Everyone's experience is
unique, and such arguments are thus both unlikely to be convincing and weak in
the extreme. To use such an argument was an error on my part which I even
expected at the time I would probably regret, but I foolishly went ahead and
did so anyway. Perhaps I will use better sense next time.

It is curious to me that you speak of a "right to private movement". This is
an idea I find it difficult to comprehend, because the movements of which you
speak are not private. They are public. They may largely have taken place
unobserved heretofore, but I find it difficult to construct an argument for
the idea that, simply because some, perhaps many, of your actions in public
have not been seen up to now, this implies the existence of a positive right
that such actions in public not be seen into the indefinite future. There is
case law to the effect that you do not have a general right to privacy within
the confines of a motor vehicle. What about a sidewalk is different?

~~~
ctack
Not sure about the legalities of a right to privacy in public spaces, although
perhaps I could have used the word unobserved instead of the word private. For
me the idea of observation goes hand in hand with the idea of self censure.

~~~
throwanem
I would be interested to know why this is the case, or why it's a serious
concern, because I really don't find myself able to comprehend it. The closest
I can come is something like not wanting to adjust my trousers or scratch
myself in a vulgar fashion if someone might see me doing it, but I doubt
that's what you mean.

~~~
ctack
You don't ever self censor posts thinking a potential future employer might
see it?

Now imagine having all your movements recorded(and possibly actions too). Who
will have access to that info now and in future? Target? Facebook? Your
parents? Your boss? Your wife/partner?

~~~
alanwatts
Most self-censoring and social conformity is done subconsciously as an
important evolutionary survival mechanism, thus most people are completely
unaware of it.

~~~
throwanem
You want to cite a source for that at all?

~~~
alanwatts
Google "subconscious social conformity" and take your pick

------
sambull
Good old "anonymous donor" providing third party technology to collect
surveillance.

------
Mathnerd314
It still needs analysts to work; could they be replaced with machine learning?

~~~
alanwatts
Yes, 99.99% of the data analysis could be done with machine learning which
could then send alerts to human operators once a certain pattern of interest
is discovered.

------
FollowSteph3
Assuming a non-oppressive government I'm all for using this type of technology
to stop crime. It is a very powerful tool that will really level the playing
field. Many crimes are from repeat offenders and this will just help catch
them quicker and more accurately. I suspect crime rates will drop dramatically
as a result of these types of technologies.

As for privacy we already give more away just to have free online services.
Think how much is tracked by Google through their searches, gmail, etc. by
Facebook to use their free service. Apple, Microsoft, etc are all known to
track all kinds of data on you. It's not like this isn't already happening.

They key is to make sure it's not abused, and I think for the most part in
first world countries this won't be a big issue. That and the benefits will
far outweigh the costs.

We just have to prevent it from escalating like in the South Park drone
episode ;)

~~~
CaptSpify
But I can choose not to participate with apple, MS, google, etc. And I do.

When did I opt-into surveillance?

~~~
fixermark
The flip-side of that question is "When can I opt-in to surveillance if I
really want that? Can my neighborhood watch be a _real_ neighborhood watch,
with collated telemetry and machine learning, but owned by private citizens?"

And then we're on the slippery slope to the burbclaves of Snow Crash. ;)

