I was mugged earlier this year. I live in a neighborhood that used to be quite rough in Brooklyn but is getting better. It was 2am and I was walking around by myself and I got mugged.
He didn't take much from me: my phone (big deal) and wallet (easy to cancel credit cards.) Along with that phone he got a lot of photos - memories - of things and at that moment I wish I had automatically backed up to a private G+ album. But I didn't because I'm pro-privacy, I think.
When I filed the police report, the detective walked up and down the block with me, seeing if there were any cameras to see where the person went, or to identify them. Ordinarily I would be part of the anti-mass-surveillance crowd, what is this, England? but at the time I might've appreciated a few cameras along that block so to maybe deter my mugger.
I often think about this when it comes to discussions of surveillance. I, like so many hackers, want privacy, anonymity, and for the government to just go away and let us enjoy the ability to live private lives. I want Google to stop trying to save all of my personal emails, photos, text messages, and location data to the cloud.
And then I say "but it would've been nice if there were a police security camera on that block." Or "I guess I have principles about google plus but I'm still out my photos."
I don't think it's so unreasonable, in a sense, for someone to feel that, if in fact these efforts are foiling peoples' ability to do us harm, that they're fruitful. What is the essential difference between wanting a stronger police/watch/community force in my Brooklyn neighborhood versus the surveillance we're talking about here?
Obviously there is some difference. But what is it?
Beyond the usual security/freedom dichotomy we can go on for ages about, there's also a question about effectiveness.
We tell ourselves that having security cameras will deter criminals, because we say "well, it won't entice them will it? ". But there are two points about this:
- How effective is this? If installing cameras all over the city of London stopped one person from being mugged, is it worth it?
The big issue with trying to measure this is two-fold. Firstly, the notion of "stopped" is a bit hard to measure. Obviously, the number of people caught thanks to evidence on the cameras counts, but if there were eyewitnesses as well, does it still count? Inversely, what about the chilling effect brought on by the cameras? How do you count the number of people who don't even think about mugging thanks to the cameras? And who's to say that the crime isn't simply displaced? Society is pretty bad at figuring out general supply demand curves (an example: We would think that raising wages would entice people to work more, but a decent amount of arguments exist to say that after a certain wage level, increasing the wage would decrease the number of hours we work (substitution effect with leisure) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backward_bending_supply_curve_o...)
-How do we measure effectiveness? I get mugged and lose a $200 phone. I think I would be slightly irked by it, and quantifying this as merely a $200 loss might insult me (especially considering I'm not very used to being mugged and I would consider it a traumatic experience).
A terrorist attack has a similar quantification problem, there are widespread psychological effects (even just the loss of loved ones, beyond the macro "security theater" stuff which induces circular reasoning). And the economic damage can be longterm.
The cameras don't seem to have much deterrant effect in the UK, nor do you often hear of them catching people or convicting them through this footage. Which makes me wonder wtf they are for...
A few months ago someone broke into my locker at the swimming pool, got my iPad, BB, credit cards, cash and car keys. Thank God I hadn't driven there. Anyway, leaving the pool, he was in full view of the CCTV. The cops reviewed the footage, and the guy is just a black silhouette, no recognizable features.
So enemies of the surveillance state rejoice, there are cameras everywhere, the footage they record however is worthless. And I dare say the thief had figured that out for himself.
Most times you see the modern equivalent of a wanted poster, it's stills from CCTV - or even cuts of video. While I doubt the quality is high enough to use evidentially in many instances, I would bet they do play a decent part in deterring or convicting people.
He didn't take much from me: my phone (big deal) and wallet (easy to cancel credit cards.) Along with that phone he got a lot of photos - memories - of things and at that moment I wish I had automatically backed up to a private G+ album. But I didn't because I'm pro-privacy, I think.
When I filed the police report, the detective walked up and down the block with me, seeing if there were any cameras to see where the person went, or to identify them. Ordinarily I would be part of the anti-mass-surveillance crowd, what is this, England? but at the time I might've appreciated a few cameras along that block so to maybe deter my mugger.
I often think about this when it comes to discussions of surveillance. I, like so many hackers, want privacy, anonymity, and for the government to just go away and let us enjoy the ability to live private lives. I want Google to stop trying to save all of my personal emails, photos, text messages, and location data to the cloud.
And then I say "but it would've been nice if there were a police security camera on that block." Or "I guess I have principles about google plus but I'm still out my photos."
I don't think it's so unreasonable, in a sense, for someone to feel that, if in fact these efforts are foiling peoples' ability to do us harm, that they're fruitful. What is the essential difference between wanting a stronger police/watch/community force in my Brooklyn neighborhood versus the surveillance we're talking about here?
Obviously there is some difference. But what is it?