Too bad it’s not true.
There seems to be 2 main camps in this thread.
Fuck the police, and fuck shitty drivers.
Both camps are correct.
Wait… really?
I don’t think so tbh. Cameras don’t really need any parts that use a lot of copper (coils or particular heatsinks usually). They might have valuable lenses or some other parts that you could resell but just the copper probably doesn’t add up to anything.
They’ve gotta get power to them somehow.
5.5 lbs (2.5 kg) are a lot for just power cables. They’d probably use something like this with a 1.5 mm² wire diameter. You’d need about 186.7 meters of this model for the specified weight.
Taking out speedtrap so driver can self regulate is like taking out CDC so big pharma can self regulate.
These aren’t about speed anymore, they’re all turning into auto license plate readers run by private corporations for an infinite surveillance dragnet
Fine by me. Cars suck. I have no sympathy at all for people who drive.
Yes, cars obviously suck. But If you don’t care about privacy for everyone, you don’t care about privacy and are therefore compliant in a surveillance state
No, I care about privacy for myself and others by extension in those areas where it affects me. For instance I also want the government to monitor all known fascists. I don’t support privacy for the enemies of democracy.
Nah I think you are just selfish, also you definitely don’t care about privacy
This is a good chance to self reflect.
EVERYONE deserves privacy. Even your enemies.
If one group of people can be labelled fascists and are therefore no longer entitled to privacy (from your example), what is stopping someone from labelling you a fascist and ending your right to privacy?
I’ll leave you with this poem, First They Came by Pastor Martin Niemöller: First they came for the Communists And I did not speak out Because I was not a Communist Then they came for the Socialists And I did not speak out Because I was not a Socialist Then they came for the trade unionists And I did not speak out Because I was not a trade unionist Then they came for the Jews And I did not speak out Because I was not a Jew Then they came for me And there was no one left To speak out for me
My house is burning! Send the fire horse post haste!
Exactly.
As much as it’s true that a lot of these cameras are just becoming other ways to engage in surveillance, it’s also true that they do a lot to manage speeding. For example, NYC had a 94% reduction in speeding in areas with the cameras. It’s also true that most existing speed cameras simply aren’t equipped to be converted into ALPR systems. Most ALPR deployments are done via the installation of brand-new hardware, which many places simply can’t justify the additional, new costs of.
This can be done with minimal surveillance capabilities, and often is in many places. (local compute board identifies license plates, calculates speeds, sends them to an isolated cloud service, and only forwards data to the police department if it was actually a speeding infraction, otherwise the data is wiped) The ALPR cameras are primarily being installed in specific areas, but aren’t always across-the-board implementations, and sometimes avoid entire cities.
For example, ALPRs are becoming popular around Washington, but the Seattle police department only has a few ALPRs solely mounted on vehicles, but zero mounted in stationary locations. (“SPD’s ALPR cameras are not fixed in location”) These aren’t even used for speeding cases, but are used for missing vehicle cases, and the speeding cameras are entirely separate.
It doesn’t make sense to eliminate all cameras, even the speeding ones, just because other cameras can be ALPRs. We should simply advocate for removing ALPRs, not speeding cameras. This is why organizations like the EFF, dedicated to protecting people’s privacy, have previously argued against these cameras broadly not because speeding cameras are also bad, but because the way those speeding camera systems were designed allowed them to also be used as ALPRs. However, I haven’t seen a single case of them arguing against cameras that are solely speeding cameras with limited capacity for surveillance, because it’s just not a very big issue.
Sorry, long rant 😅
Fuck your spy cameras. If speeding was really an issue they have the technology to prevent it. Every day I hear dumber and dumber ideas and thoughts and I just want to move out of this country.
There are obviously alternatives, I don’t deny that. But as good as infrastructure and cultural improvements can be, it doesn’t change the fact that speeding cameras have proven themselves to be immensely effective, and don’t require massive infrastructure projects, much more costly spending, and long-time cultural shifts. That’s just the unfortunate reality of the situation.
I’m a big digital rights and privacy advocate, and I don’t advocate for “spy cameras.” I advocate for privacy-preserving systems that improve society when they can exist in such a way.
A camera that only sends your plate to a police system when you speed, and automatically sends you a ticket for endangering other people is not a surveillance system. It’s a public safety measure, with justifiable, minimum data transmission requirements to operate effectively. A system that tracks every location your plate was seen is a surveillance system. That is not what non-“smart” traffic cameras are.
Speeding cameras are the first system, unless integrated with an ALPR system, in which case they become a surveillance system. I am advocating for the former, not the latter.
Lets just skip the middle and put a chip in your brain. Just a nice well behaved housecat.
Or, why not just build roads that inhibit speeding? It’s safer, or doesn’t allow anyone to track people, and you’re not advocating for a surveillance state.
Whether you like it or not, the second that “Speeding Camera” goes online, it becomes a surveillance device. The only thing stopping bad actors are laws which like speeding, are constantly broken. You’re fucked if your government is the bad actor.
Advocate for designing streets that reduce speed, not adding surveillance cameras and pretending that the safety reduction is worth the invasion of your privacy.
Anybody can hack a camera, no one can hack an already built road. You’re pretending like these cameras aren’t easy as fuck to access.
You can build infrastructure that encourages reasonable people to drive slower (an example I’m thinking of - you can remove priority rules at a junction and force drivers to negotiate it on a more ad hoc basis, which requires a lower speed to see what everyone is doing). You can’t build infrastructure which does this for everyone. Joe Twatface will just speed through that junction and let everyone else slam their brakes on.
A lot of features that discourage dangerous driving also prevent emergency vehicles from going at high speed.
On faster roads, these traffic-calming measures are generally undesirable also.
So: the methods are limited and have disadvantages. Traffic cameras can fill in the gaps.
If your traffic cameras are accessible to private companies who can misuse that data, that’s a problem that needs to be addressed in legislation. If your traffic cameras are accessible to police who are fundamentally compromised as part of a proto-fascist state apparatus, it’d be good to link your protests against cameras (which exist all around the world) to their use by proto-fascists (which haven’t co-opted the government all around the world, yet). And there are probably more effective ways of disrupting them.
Or, why not just build roads that inhibit speeding
As I already stated, doing that is not quick, easy, or cheap. Mounting a camera to a pole is much more cost effective, and quick to set up in the short term, even if it’s not the ideal long-term solution.
They’ve been proven to reduce speed, injuries, and deaths, and there’s vanishingly few cases in which regular, non-“smart” traffic cameras operating under the technological standards I mentioned have ever been utilized for any form of surveillance that produced a measurable harm for any individual, that I could find. That is why I advocate for those, not for “smart” ones like Flock’s.
I don’t think it should be a permanent solution, but I’d rather have speed cameras now, with road improvements later, over zero measures to prevent speeding now, with the hope that traffic calming infrastructure will be feasible and actually get done later down the line. Infrastructure isn’t free, and cameras aren’t either, but cameras are a hell of a lot cheaper.
A camera is a camera, and there are no lightpole cameras that are SD Card read only with no access to the internet.
You know what that means right? That anybody can access them if they’re smart enough? You keep reiterating the same thing while fundamentally not understanding, or choosing not to care that a camera is a camera. Don’t give up your privacy just because it’s the cheaper option.
You clearly are fine being surveiled though so this conversation is pointless.
If speeding was really an issue they have the technology to prevent it
Like building alternatives to cars so not every dipshit, 15 year old, and elderly person, are forced to share the road
Thank you for an actual logical response I was pretty disappointed until this comment.
damn that sucks bro, I’m cutting down the camera anyway because we live under the beginning fourth reich and surveillance must be fought.
Maybe police should go back to being visible on the street to control driver behavior and city road design be built around calming traffic patterns, instead of using completely undercover normal looking vehicles for traffic enforcement and then raking in millions of dollars by sitting on their ass and letting the camera do all the work?
Maybe police should go back to being visible on the street to control driver behavior
I’d rather avoid inflating police budgets if I can help it. Especially since such a system then lends itself to those same cops advocating for increased surveillance measures because it makes their job easier. They’re the people who wanted the built-in ALPR systems, after all.
city road design be built around calming traffic patterns
100% agree. Yet while I want these to be more widespread, they take money, time, and lots of urban planning. In the meantime, I see traffic cameras (specifically those NOT integrated with ALPR systems that store locations in a central database) as a good stopgap solution for areas that don’t yet/can’t build out those measures in a reasonable timeframe.
instead of using completely undercover normal looking vehicles for traffic enforcement and then raking in millions of dollars by sitting on their ass and letting the camera do all the work?
Also agreed. The pigs don’t need more money for doing less work, hence why I think the prior idea of having them be visible is still a bad idea, because they can simply sit there and… also do nothing.
And if they set quotas, then the measure becomes a goal, and it ceases to be a good measure, as cops will just pull more people over because it “seemed like they were going fast”, and everyone’s days get just a little bit worse.
You don’t have a speedtrap issue, you have private vulture issue. Signing the enforcement right to private company is a recipe for disaster.
Sure, yeah if they were only used to snap pictures of people speeding I wouldn’t have a problem but that’s not what they’re limited to.
There are a LOT of other cameras placed everywhere that collect your data, being mad at the objects that also try to get drivers to behave isn’t the best use of our desire to rebel against authority. Maybe let’s attack the corporations and not the infrastructure hardware.
While you’re not exactly wrong, there are multiple types of cameras.
The ones at the convenience store or watching the street in front of a business are probably CCTV, and the store only has so much history stored and, most importantly, it’s only accessible with a warrant.
Speed trap cameras are maybe isolated and only deliver data to the police… I’m not aware of how they work and they predate the ‘hardware as a service’ model we have to live with today.
Flock and similar kinds of cameras, though, are a service that your local government or businesses subscribe to. They are tracking vehicles (maybe people/faces, who knows, black box) and other metadata across the country, collating that data centrally, are not accountable to tax payers, have no ToS for the people they are tracking and thus no way to request or delete your data, the data at rest is not subject to many government regulations the way data on a government server would be, and accessing that data doesn’t require a warrant. While theoretically that data is “owned” by the local jurisdiction or business, there appear to be no safeguards preventing the federal government from querying it all at once, or any hacker with a stolen credential.
Notably, Flock’s privacy policy doesn’t include the actual humans and cars it is monitoring, only the ‘administrator, customers, and team creators’ that access the data. Police privacy is maintained, but not yours.
This “infrastructure hardware” is owned by the corporations, not your government. We have corporations acting as government intelligence agencies and if that doesn’t frighten you, it should: They aren’t beholden to the same laws and restrictions that come with that scope and scale.
Use a FOIA request to find out if a given camera is owned by your city/state. If not, show up at your townhall and demand it be accountable as if it were.
The ones around me have a flash that goes off when it’s dark out and someone runs the traffic light.
If they can only get a clear picture with a flash, it’s pretty obvious they’re not continuously scanning cars, at least at night.
FDA, but yeah.
Such a naive view how does a tax on speed regulate anything? You must be to poor to afford lawyers to get rid of your tickets, probably don’t even own a car that can accelerate faster than the limit.
how does a tax on speed regulate anything?
So what’s your alternative? Non-hidden speedtrap at least slow people down to desirable speed in the area while allow emergency vehicle to speed through, having no speed trap and people will just speed through the area with no friction.
You must be to poor to afford lawyers to get rid of your tickets
How many people in your country can afford to hire a lawyer for a ticket write off?
probably don’t even own a car that can accelerate faster than the limit.
Are the speed limit in front of the school or in the city in your country 90mph?
- Everything is black and white to you how surprising.
- I’m sorry you’re poor.
- 90mph is not very fast lol.
projection.
You’re so good at this your mother and I are so proud of you.
Lame. 🥱
projection.
Ea Nasir is a really interesting case study of how one piece of information can be interpreted in two completely different ways.
One interpretation, and the one most people know, is that the authors of the clay tablets complaints are legitimate.
The other is that Ea Nasir kept them as a record of people attempting to harm his reputation. So he could remember who to avoid doing business with in the future.
Also ancient Sumer had a pretty decent legal system for it’s time, it’s entirely possible Ea-Nasir was keeping the tablets for a possible court case. So the ancient equivalent of saving texts from a shit customer.
Your honor, I have 500 lbs of receipts.
“What’s a pound? Some savages measurements from the east? We use mina.”
Mina? I barely mined’a!
I will go home now, don’t mind me, coming through, heyyyup.
- he was gathering evidence of an employee or delivery partner comitting fraud
So it’s like the Lemmy modlog. Maybe it’s a log of mods calling out bad users, maybe it’s a log of mods lying and power tripping.
^ this person has been horribly wronged.
Awww, thanks! ^^
It was meant as an observation, but I’m glad you take such passion in your work, Mummy’s Little Blood Slut! <3
Suppliuppliuma II accepts your proposition, in spite of wearing nothing but an over-sized bath towel.
Awful copper
Worst trade experiemce of my life. I will not be returning
Best copper
Best trade I ever had. I will for sure return.
5 stars
I would give this merchant zero stars if I could
This is brilliant.
Dangerous roads are brilliant?
The camera doesn’t make the road safer it makes it more expensive
More expensive for who?
For people who blow through traffic lights.
Wait until they find out about the gold-plated interconnects.
Friendly reminder that no technology is ever intrinsically good or bad, that is determined by who wields it and to what end.
And flock cameras are apparently easily rooted and repurposed.
Copper you say?
I heard the ones in school zones actually have 10lb of copper and a chocolate bar inside
Sure, remove the red light but please also remove cars.
Gonna be downvoted, because apparently this is car brain central, but the amount of mental gymnastics people will do to make red light camera enforcement “bad” is crazy.
The US’ private company control over these cameras notwithstanding.
Fuck me, so many people die on on roads, and especially at intersections.
I just don’t think having this kind of surveillance state apparatus is ever worth it I don’t want the government or private companies tracking my every move.
I don’t even own a car and I want these cameras gone.
People enjoy driving dangerously. They don’t see it as risky because they haven’t been killed in a crash yet.
Cops enforcing traffic? Bad.
Cameras enforcing traffic? Bad.
very few people would complain about traffic police if the cops didn’t carry guns or were not trained to pit maneuver you for not wearing a seatbelt
Shout out to Road Guy Rob
The city I work for put up Flock cameras with specific instructions from Council that they were only to be used for identification of cars flagged in active warrants.
Within a week of their installation, police used the cameras to track the movements of someone who filed a complaint.
Fuck the police
The US’ private companies
this is entirely the problem, because they’re turning over info to ICE and other agencies and it’s being used oppressively.
That is a voter problem rather than a camera problem.
We should also state how much that is in dollar bucks.
Just about $23 per camera where I’m at
how much cameras until i can buy 1 portiom of black tar heroine?
4
One would get you ~2-3 bags of heroin but black tar heroines haven’t been sold since the 1860s in the US thankfully, so I couldn’t quote you a price on that.
Bright shiny copper is just under $4/lb where I am. It varies by location and what your recyclers will pay.
I just don’t think there’s that much copper in a camera. That’s a lot of weight for a camera by itself.
It’s true! Little known fact, they also have their own catalytic converter
