Watching me, watching you!

29 Jun 2009

Just been watching a programme about CCTV and Surveillance. By all accounts we are the most watched country in the world.
I learnt a few things tonight - I really didn't realise we were watched as much as we are. From systems that more and more council authorities are linking into that watch our cars with flying drones etc. and mark the ones of interest - in other words put on the hot list. To people being watched on a beach to catch those who don't use poop an scoops!
They highlighted Middlesbrough - where the camera's in the shopping centre pick up on people who drop litter, they are asked to pick it up via loud speaker an place it in the nearest bins. If not - fined Â£80. I suppose this is intended to humiliate you into being a more conscientious citizen.
A family who were checking out schools were interviewed - they were put under surveillance for three weeks to check they lived in the catchment area!
Recently my son renewed his passport - as he lost his old one and there is a confusion over my past surnames he had to go for an interview. He was asked if he had used certain mobile numbers (they accessed his mobile phone account while he was present) and checked email addresses were his. He had forgotten about one email address and they wouldn't move on till he stated it was his.
The state has access to all this information, even the location of where your mobile phone is used.
Just how far do you think this will go? Is it far enough? Who is monitoring us and why? Who is in control and making the decisions? We certainly aren't involved in the decision making as far as I'm aware? What about our rights as citizens - that's if you believe we have any lol

Is all this a waste of money? Whose paying for it? How safe is the data held on us?
Anais

29 Jun 2009

Mr Orwell was only about 30 years out with his dates!
Big Brother is well and truly here and it will only get worse unless something is done. Lets just hope a Conservative Government scuppers the National Identity card scheme!
Telecom companies and ISP's now have to keep a record of all our phone conversations and e-mails and make them accessible to whichever government body requests them.
This is all done in the supposed fight against terror but as you say, local councils are now invoking these "rights" in instances of dog fouling, waste disposal and parents trying to get their kids into schools.
As to the cost, the burden inevitably falls upon the taxpayer and as for the safety of the data................... :shock:

29 Jun 2009

It's been said that we in the UK are sleepwalking into a surveillance society ... I think we are largely already there and the move has been steadily towards a presumption of guilt as opposed to innocence.
Some will argue that if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear ... a very naive line of thinking in my view ... it is always far easier to give up rights/freedoms than it is to get them back once given up.

29 Jun 2009

Quote by anais
snip...
They highlighted Middlesbrough - where the camera's in the shopping centre pick up on people who drop litter, they are asked to pick it up via loud speaker an place it in the nearest bins. If not - fined Â£80. I suppose this is intended to humiliate you into being a more conscientious citizen.
Anais

I read a bit of UK news last week or so, a gentleman apparently accidentally dropped a tenner out of his pocket. He was seen by a couple of Police Officers who very kindly pointed it out to him.
Having picked up the Â£10 note, the officers then issued him with a fixed penalty for dropping litter :grin:

29 Jun 2009

More cameras than anywhere in the world, and yet crime still goes up, go figure.........

29 Jun 2009

Quote by GnV
snip...
They highlighted Middlesbrough - where the camera's in the shopping centre pick up on people who drop litter, they are asked to pick it up via loud speaker an place it in the nearest bins. If not - fined Â£80. I suppose this is intended to humiliate you into being a more conscientious citizen.
Anais

I read a bit of UK news last week or so, a gentleman apparently accidentally dropped a tenner out of his pocket. He was seen by a couple of Police Officers who very kindly pointed it out to him.
Having picked up the Â£10 note, the officers then issued him with a fixed penalty for dropping litter :grin:
That's unlikely. Do you have a link to the article?

30 Jun 2009

Quote by foxylady2209
snip...
They highlighted Middlesbrough - where the camera's in the shopping centre pick up on people who drop litter, they are asked to pick it up via loud speaker an place it in the nearest bins. If not - fined Â£80. I suppose this is intended to humiliate you into being a more conscientious citizen.
Anais

I read a bit of UK news last week or so, a gentleman apparently accidentally dropped a tenner out of his pocket. He was seen by a couple of Police Officers who very kindly pointed it out to him.
Having picked up the Â£10 note, the officers then issued him with a fixed penalty for dropping litter :grin:
That's unlikely. Do you have a link to the article?

30 Jun 2009

Aye I dont like it.
And I suppose "if it saves one life", but then how many mor elives could you save with the kind of cash we spend on watching innocent people.
That book the Traveller by John Twelve Hawks has a great spin on this.

30 Jun 2009

Cannot understand peoples problems.
If you are doing nothing wrong, then why does it bother some?
It is there for many reasons but most of the people with something to hide, shout the loudest.

30 Jun 2009

I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt.......and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get wink

30 Jun 2009

The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 or more commonly known as RIPA. This is something what the press has been bandied about to say that Councils are now snooping about. RIPA is a regulation to give back the freedoms of the people and to stop abuse of surveilance.
In the past the authorities could do anything but now they have to follow a set procedure that can be scrutinised by the public. With RIPA the press had a field day to say "Look how much the Council can snoop". What they forgot to say is that the RIPA only applies to certain parts for council work. The rest is for the police.
This applies to covert surveillance only. If I walked down a public road in full view then I can snap away to my hearts content. A picture paints a thousand words and filming someone dropping litter is better than a "he said she said" duel in court. This is why traffic wardens now photograph the offence as well as issue the fine. It certainly stops a lot of appeals.
Dropping litter is not the most heinous crime, but it is anti-social and a nuisance. Most anti-social and nuisance related problems are highest on the agenda for most of the public. So legislation has been passed to enforce it.
Dave_Notts

30 Jun 2009

Quote by kentswingers777
Cannot understand peoples problems.
If you are doing nothing wrong, then why does it bother some?
It is there for many reasons but most of the people with something to hide, shout the loudest.

I have to quote myself (bad form possibly) to answer that ...

Quote by DarkJedi
... the move has been steadily towards a presumption of guilt as opposed to innocence.
Some will argue that if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear ... a very naive line of thinking in my view ... it is always far easier to give up rights/freedoms than it is to get them back once given up.

... which pretty much is same as Max777's view ... and I'm not a tree hugger either wink

30 Jun 2009

Quote by Max777
I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt.......and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get

To be honest if I did not know better, I would think you could be a tad paranoid confused

:
A police state? Don't you think that is pushing things a bit far here?

1 Jul 2009

I used to work in a community where CCTV was part of our daily lives. We had 10 camera's behind and in front of a mix of office units and a residential premises.
The organisation I worked for were responsible for the camera's and received daily logs for monitoring by one of our projects.
Everyone got used to living our daily lives in front of camera,s. No-body worried about them as it was local knowledge that the camera's were rubbish. CCTV didn't make a difference to the high crime rate in this small area. In fact - most of those who were doing something wrong thought it was laughable and purposely did things of a criminal nature in front of them to prove a point!
It was a rare occurrence that anyone was convicted from CCTV footage. In this case - CCTV didn't make a difference to this community who were totally fed up of the high crime rate and disturbance this caused them.
Then one day - someone managed to find some extra funding to update the camera's to new fangled state of art with inbuilt zoom that can see between ya ears ones (still relies on those camera's being monitored by a human). People didn't believe they were so good until *some* of criminal fraternity started to be convicted. Result for this troubled community!
Unfortunately, what happens eventually is crime moves into the outer zone where no camera's are. So some other poor sod gets all the crap!
I personally have nothing to hide - I don't care who sees me doing what. That's not the point though for me, I agree with Max and D Jedi. Were will it all end???
The 2nd part of the programme was on yesterday - can't remember all the points though confused

One of the things that stood out for me is how many private organisations are about who employ ex military (for example) to go undercover filming people. It seems private organisations don't come under the same rules as local authorities etc. and can basically do what they want.
Yep, I'm a tree hugger and would get involved in any demo's/community action concerning this. Which reminds me of another case where people who have been involved in small peaceful demo's have been put on *hot lists* and surveillance. Guilty until proven innocent?

1 Jul 2009

Quote by Max777
I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt....... and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get

Like what it is in Scotland of course... :wink:

1 Jul 2009

Quote by kentswingers777
I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt.......and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get

To be honest if I did not know better, I would think you could be a tad paranoid confused

:
A police state? Don't you think that is pushing things a bit far here?
Absolutely not paranoid in any way....maybe I have a little more vision than you? We may not live in a police state yet but there have been massive erosions of our freedom under this government which have gone virtually unchallenged....are you OK with the fact that the government and no doubt countless "agencies" have full access to your every phone call, text, e-mail and web search? What happens if the police get their way and are able to build a complete DNA data base? You don't see the inherent dangers and the continuing pattern?

1 Jul 2009

Quote by GnV
I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt....... and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get

Like what it is in Scotland of course... :wink:
I'm no expert in law, so really can't comment on that fact. I do know Scottish law has a verict of "not proven" which English Law doesn't but whether that affects the basic concept of innonce/guilt, I have no idea.

1 Jul 2009

Quote by kentswingers777
Cannot understand peoples problems.
If you are doing nothing wrong, then why does it bother some?
It is there for many reasons but most of the people with something to hide, shout the loudest.

The red bit is one of the snidest and nastiest insinuations I have ever seen on these forums. Typical of crass ignorance to attack folk to their core for stating an opinion.

1 Jul 2009

Quote by Max777
I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt.......and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get

To be honest if I did not know better, I would think you could be a tad paranoid confused

:
A police state? Don't you think that is pushing things a bit far here?
Absolutely not paranoid in any way....maybe I have a little more vision than you? We may not live in a police state yet but there have been massive erosions of our freedom under this government which have gone virtually unchallenged....are you OK with the fact that the government and no doubt countless "agencies" have full access to your every phone call, text, e-mail and web search? What happens if the police get their way and are able to build a complete DNA data base? You don't see the inherent dangers and the continuing pattern?
Indeed Max!
The point Kent is that you might well believe our government and security services are all thoroughly decent and trustworthy individuals now ((( though I'm not sure you actually believe any such thing! ;) ))) but what happens if we have less trustworthy types in charge in future?
The freedoms we enjoy are being steadily eroded, bit by bit, because people either don't actually notice what's happening, or they're prepared to accept things like increased surveillance, data holding, etc, because after all, if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear, right? Once we've lost those freedoms though, it will be very, very hard to get them back. It took centuries of struggle to win them in the first place from the powers that be. The idea that we should meekly accept the loss of them without fuss is one of the most dangerous ideas there is IMO. It's how tyrants come to power Kent.
N x x x ;)

1 Jul 2009

Succinct & well put Nelly.
And while I'm here, should the powers that be be reading this...ID card? Not on your life- you can omprison me before you'll tell me what I must carry with me at all times.
Aside from anything else, I ain't carrying a handbag for nobody. rolleyes

1 Jul 2009

Quote by kentswingers777
I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will shout long and hard about the erosion of our freedom. What you fail to see Kent,is the slow, insidious slide into a police state, where you will have to prove your innocence rather than they having to prove your guilt.......and I'm about as far from a tree hugging liberal as you can get

To be honest if I did not know better, I would think you could be a tad paranoid confused

:
A police state? Don't you think that is pushing things a bit far here?
I think you are a little naive here Kentswingers777, earlier on this year the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 was introduced, which included a contentious clause, Section 58, which has made it an offence to elicit, publish or communicate information of a member of HM Armed Forces, a member of any intelligence service, or a constable, this also includes taking photographs of the above mentioned persons, and within Section 58, it says:
â€œ58A Eliciting, publishing or communicating information about members of armed forces etc
(1) A person commits an offence whoâ€”
(a) elicits or attempts to elicit information about an individual who is or has beenâ€”
(i) a member of Her Majestyâ€™s forces,
(ii) a member of any of the intelligence services, or
(iii) a constable,
which is of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism, or
(b) publishes or communicates any such information.
(2) It is a defence for a person charged with an offence under this section to prove that they had a reasonable excuse for their action."
I have highlighted subsection (2), because it is down to the individual to prove they were not committing or preparing for an act of terrorism, so the police state, where you have to prove your innocence before they are required to prove your guilt is now a feature of our legal system, and who is to say that there will not be more amendments to come?