Posted on 02/13/2002 6:15:46 AM PST by goldylight
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Washington police are building what will be the nation's biggest network of surveillance cameras to monitor shopping areas, streets, monuments and other public places in the U.S. capital, a move that worries civil liberties groups, The Wall Street Journal said on Wednesday.
The system would eventually include hundreds of cameras, linking existing devices in Metro mass transit stations, public schools and traffic intersections to new digital cameras mounted to watch over neighborhoods and shopping districts, the Journal said.
"In the context of Sept. 11, we have no choice but to accept greater use of this technology," Stephen Gaffigan, the head of the police department project, told the Journal.
He said city officials had studied the British surveillance system, which has more than 2 million cameras throughout the country, and were "intrigued by that model."
One of the first uses of police surveillance cameras in Washington was April 2000, when authorities set up a network to monitor protests during a meeting of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, the newspaper said.
On Tuesday morning, in response to the latest terror alert issued by the Justice Department, police activated a $7 million command center that was first used on Sept. 11. The command center, which has dozens of video stations for monitoring cameras, will remain in use until federal officials end the alert, the Journal reported.
Cameras installed by the police have been programmed to scan public areas automatically, and officers can take over manual control if they want to examine something more closely.
The system currently does not permit an automated match between a face in the crowd and a computerized photo of a suspect, the Journal said. Gaffigan said officials were looking at the technology but had not decided whether to use it.
Eventually, images will be viewable on computers already installed in most of the city's 1,000 squad cars, the Journal said.
The Journal said the plans for Washington went far beyond what was in use in other U.S. cities, a development that worries civil liberties advocates.
Barry Steinhardt, associate director of the American Civil Liberties Union in New York, noted there were few legal restrictions of video surveillance of public streets. But he said that by setting up a "central point of surveillance," it becomes likely that "the cameras will be more frequently used and more frequently abused."
"You are building in a surveillance infrastructure, and how it's used now is not likely how it's going to be used two years from now or five years from now," he told the Journal.
I can't keep track of all the posts either.
I have a book on body language. It does tell what's going on inside a person pretty well. It's based on conditioned responce.
Some people just walk fast, though. It shows they're busy and/or their mind is occupied.
Crossing arms shows defensiveness.
People may have something on their mind other than crime, but the body movements would be similar. It's just nerviousness. It happens in life all the time.
Pretty scary for the innocent citizen, aye?.
It is NOT. (Did your locality follow the District Of Chaos in that total ban on handguns that D.C. did years ago?)
Face it, people inside Washington are paranoid about terrorism - because it and Manhattan, Blue Nation's political and cultural/financial capitals, are the only places bin Laden's ilk seems much interested in. They know that, if bin Laden uses some sort of "dirty nuke" tomorrow, his target won't be Asheboro, North Carolina - but will be them.
Add to that the fact that D.C.'s demographics are so different from those of even most of Blue Nation - much less Red Nation - and that it has no real economy but the feral government, and you fast see why it's no "vanguard" for localities across the U.S.
Downright hopeless.
Even given the responses on this thread, I don't think people in general understand the implications of this.
Freedom is over.
I am thinking right now of a 0cents Stamp to "ridicule" this concept...not yours, theirs!
No, KJ, I've been fighting this battle at least as long as you. It has gotten nowhere. The sheep do not respond to logic or rational thought. My thoughts today were to respond in the way of reductio ad absurdum. That you and others fell for it shows only that we are well and truly gone. Because you know as well as I that there are people, right here on FR, who could have easily posted the same inanities as I did.What I wrote in mockery is daily posted here seriously.
Yeah, "It Can't Happen Here...." Right.
The traffic cameras are very unpopular here. I find it hard to believe they raise revenue on balance (I have become much more reluctant to drive into D.C. since they were installed, as I suspect many other people have as well, which means less sales -- and less tax revenue -- in D.C.). And yet the D.C. government seems determined to maintain the program.
But we still can't name a country, so far. We'll be declaring a war on a concept, a religious death cult.
There's a few in Iran, a few in Pakastan, even a few right here in America.
I agreed with a time limit on the "protections" though. The no end deal didn't work for me either. I pictured Clinton with this type of power!
I agree they should be telling us more, but the masses may not be as strong. Panic is not the answer either.
This truely is a different type of "war."
But the differece is made up by fines paid.
One second too late going through that light brings in the cash.
Some places have even shortened the time for the yellow light to bring in more money. They got caught here doing that. Nothing happened to stop them, though.
They'll drag away the first 3 and give them long terms, there won't be a 4th much less 50.
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