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Federal judge calls Flock 'indiscriminate mass surveillance'

483 points · 267 comments · sbulaev

  1. charcircuit · · focus · HN ↗
    What you do on public roads is public.

    The idea that law enforcement tapping into existing law enforcement knowledge constitutes as a search of "persons, houses, papers, and effects" does not logically follow for me. It is a search of law enforcements own property.

    1. slowin · · focus · HN ↗
      > It is a search of law enforcements own property.

      The roads are not law enforcement's property and my private car on a public road is private property that requires a warrant to search. These things should be totally banned, but even your argument is wrong since Flocks don't mask just the road, they record everything in their field of view.

      1. charcircuit · · focus · HN ↗
        >The roads are not law enforcement's property

        I was referring data as the property. Accessing a public fact of your car is not the same as actually searching through a car.

        >they record everything in their field of view.

        And those areas are still part of the public.

        1. 0xbadcafebee · · focus · HN ↗
          The point of these lawsuits is that they don't have the right to search the data they have now, and possibly don't even have a right to have that data. The law says they need a good reason to search not just your property, but for information about you that isn't necessarily your property. Searching where you go 24/7 is a search, just like searching the phone company for what phone numbers you call is a search. In each case they are looking for information about you that they don't have a right to have without a very good reason.
          1. charcircuit · · focus · HN ↗
            We are talking about reasonable searching then. Police do go searching 24/7. They are called patrol units and they are active looking in public for crime. Just because there is technology doing the patrol and remember what is seen that doesn't change anything. Technology is making law enforcement more efficient. Instead of having to scale enforcement by hiring more humans, we can now purchase technology instead.
            1. 0xbadcafebee · · focus · HN ↗
              Law is more complicated than that. Constitutional rights trump everything else. You have a right to be protected from unreasonable search, more than the police have the right to track your movements at all times for no particular reason. If what they do violates your constitutional right, it's illegal.
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