My actual privacy

Your public privacy (which isn’t changing just because software is doing a job previously done by humans) or your private privacy (which just isn’t changing)?

which just isn’t changing

Says who.

Bunch of cyclists gathering for a ride. The cameras detect a mob and track you or despatch the riot police?

Loving the demo of the CCTV system to find the suspect/victim.

Computer: Find me all the young women with long blonde hair, tight white top and a short denim skirt. Now play video of them. Show me where they live!

Says who.

Bunch of cyclists gathering for a ride. The cameras detect a mob and track you or despatch the riot police?

Then we’ve bought the dumbest behavioral recognition software on the planet. Is this being run from Edinburgh?

Have quickly read the transcript – still not concerned. He seems to be implying that handing someone your email passwords for them to troll is the same as monitoring for specific events? And having privacy in your home is the same as privacy in public?

I find this kind of thing very worrying, for two main reasons:

1. Scope creep. Anti-terrorism legislation is already used to stop peaceful protest; just because the current government says this monitoring is only about crime doesn’t mean that the next one won’t find more inventive uses for it.

2. Commercial use: in 10 years time facial and gait recognition will be capable of detecting when you park your car, the route you took to the cinema, the restaurant you stopped at, and the time you took to get back to your starting point. That kind of information is massively valuable to advertisers, insurance companies, etc. What’s going to stop a future government from selling that data?

legend – Member

Your public privacy (which isn’t changing just because software is doing a job previously done by humans) or your private privacy (which just isn’t changing)?

No, my actual privacy, as I stated.
The ability for me to go about my legal business without being watched and tracked.
I am actually losing this ability.

This is in contrast to the fallacy that the millions of cameras that we have make us safer.

This is in contrast to the fallacy that the millions of cameras that we have make us safer.

I would love to see concrete evidence that CCTV on its own actual reduced crime. It may help catch people after the fact and even then the footage is usually horrifically bad though the tech is improving, but I doubt anyone decides not to mug or stab someone because there’s a camera pointing at them.

It’s an illusion of safety at best, and an erosion of privacy.

IME the only street CCTV that is of much use is the systems with a human operator. Footage from fixed cameras covering a whole street is often little help. It may show something of an incident but little detail and almost never good enough footage to identify a suspect. On the other hand footage from an operator seeing something developing and zooming in is very useful both in directing cops to the scene and for evidential purposes.

Does it prevent crime? I think it displaces a fair bit away from the cameras. It certainly doesn’t prevent much spontaneous crime where alcohol is involved. I’ve seen live ongoing footage of someone getting his head kicked in outside a club where it was well known there was a town centre CCTV system. The problem there was lack of resources meant nobody available to send as being a Fri or Sat night all resources were already dealing with other incidents elsewhere.

I did deal with one reported assault where I found footage after searching the system. Not enough to ID the other party. But enough to show that my “victim” had in fact started it by headbutting someone else after exchanging a few words then happened to come off worse. So it was useful in establishing the facts but wasn’t anywhere near good enough for an identification.

The problem there was lack of resources meant nobody available to send as being a Fri or Sat night all resources were already dealing with other incidents elsewhere.

So this camera thing is part of a £24 million pound project. I’d wager that spending that £24 million on more police on the beat and better resources for them on a day to day basis would probably do far more good than lining the pockets of the company that made these cameras.

Definitely Bob, I feel sick when I see stories of the money Glasgow City Council waste. They’re like a dictatorship doing whatever they like as they can’t be kicked out!

sbob – Member
No, my actual privacy, as I stated.
The ability for me to go about my legal business without being watched and tracked
I am actually losing this ability

You never had any in the first place.

They’re like a dictatorship doing whatever they like as they can’t be kicked out

Yeah we’ll soon see about that, hopefully.

Next bunch will be just as bad.

Timely example of more money being thrown around like confettihttp://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-31606326

This planning consent will unlock over £300m of private sector investment for Glasgow

Buchanan Galleries is just fine as it is, and I actually took a walk through it yesterday and noticed a few empty shops. If they can’t fill existing shops then what hope for a £390m expansion? I’d rather see that money used to revamp Sauchiehall Street which is an absolute toilet these days with a heady mix of boarded up shops, pound shops and e-cigarette shops. Grim.

BoardinBob – Spot on.