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Mind How You Walk - Someone is Watching

Posted by Zonk on Tue Mar 27, 2007 11:09 AM
from the they-can-seee-yooo dept.
Security Government Privacy Politics
mrbluze writes "The Telegraph has an opinion article about the future of the extensive CCTV network in the United Kingdom. Automated analysis of how and where people are walking or otherwise moving, and what objects they carry or leave behind, flags the attention of security staff. This is meant to preempt a crime and make suspects identifiable even by gait. The technology is of questionable public benefit since street crime has not decreased despite the presence of CCTV. 'An airport camera can be programmed to know what a departure hall should look like, with thousands of separate movements. A single suitcase left for any length of time would trigger an alarm. This technology was developed for use in hotels to alert staff to a breakfast tray left outside a room. Soon, it will be coming to a street near you. Why not go the whole hog and have microphones attached to cameras or embedded in street lights?'"
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  • Silly Walks (Score:5, Funny)

    by Leibherk (112156) <Leibherk@@@hotmail...com> on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:11AM (#18502431)
    I wonder if it can identify silly walks.
      • he wouldn't mess up the system. He would be very easy to track using the system.

        Step1: id new target
        Step2: characterize target
        Step3: analyze future targets
        Step4: compare with previously cataloged characteristics.
        Step5: identify targets with matching characteristics as being the same target.

        silly walk man just made step 5 very easy by making steps 2 and 4 very distinct from all other targets.

        Now, if everyone walked silly, that would be different. There should be a grassroots 'walk silly f

  • Finally! (Score:4, Funny)

    by HolyCrapSCOsux (700114) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:11AM (#18502435)
    The first Ministry of silly walks?
  • Why not go the whole hog and have microphones attached to cameras or embedded in street lights?

    Already done :-( I don't know about sleepwalking into a surveillance society. I think we're running towards it with open arms at the moment. http://tinyurl.com/2vbx8g [tinyurl.com]

    • Re:Big Brother alive and well in the UK (Score:5, Insightful)

      by peterprior (319967) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:31AM (#18502731)
      From the article you linked to:

      "The mobile units cost £15,000 each and are similar in design to the cameras used in the reality show Big Brother in that they can rotate 360 degrees."

      I'm amazed people don't see the irony here..

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by superbrose (1030148)

      What good is having CCTV and microphones when the punishment does not fit the crime?

      A friend of mine was attacked in a pub for spilling someone else's pint of beer. Despite apologising, he was punched in the face and had to go to hospital, where he received numerous stitches.

      Upset about the whole event he sued his assailant - the outcome: No fine, no social work, but simply a Warning.

      How is this going to deter anyone? Who cares about being filmed and convicted of some crime or another, if there is no pro

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by kencurry (471519)
        how come the brits say "go to hospital"

        and the americans say "go to THE hospital"?

        Why don't the brits use an article there?

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by ozbird (127571)
          Why don't the brits use an article there?

          Hey, it's their language...

          Do you "go to bed", or "go to THE bed"? "Go to hell", or "go to THE hell?" etc.

          As a counter argument, why do (some) Americans say "I'm going to the mall; you want to go with?" Go with what, bells on?

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by arivanov (12034)
            In every single one of them you will wait for 7 hours before being admitted and after that receive letters from the local health authority which ask "are you dead, and if you are not yet have you sorted yourself out so we can stop bothering".

            I got so pissed off from these that I have answered "No, despite your best efforts, I am not dead yet, and I have not sorted myself out, so you can forget the idea of removing me off that waiting list". Got an letter boiling of righteous indignation in return and had an

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Seumas (6865)
      As an American it is apparently my duty to give up my freedom and privacy and conveniences to protect children from being molested, old ladies from being mugged and terrorists from... uh... doing whatever.

      Remember, we must give up the freedoms we are fighting for so we can defeat the terrorists who want to take those freedoms away!

          • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

            by nuzak (959558)
            > Ask ten random people, in person, to list the ten amendments that make up the Bill of Rights.

            "The first amendment, the second amendment, the third amendment, the fourth amendment ..."

      • "There are already microphones attached to telephone poles in high crime areas of Chicago to detect gunshots and alert police..."

        I wonder how hard it would be to come up with a player device to simulate gunshots?

        Would be interesting to have a few friends in different parts of the city...some maybe across the st. from each other, and fire out gunshot sounds. Heck, make it interesting...mix up the reports, like a few 357 magnums, maybe a 50 cal Desert Eagle, some shotguns...for real fun, get one full auto here and there.

        I can't imagine at this point, there is a law against playing gunshot 'sounds'....

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Grishnakh (216268)
          The problem is you'd need a powerful stereo and big-ass speakers to simulate the sound of a gunshot.

          But if you could do it, go all out: make it play machine guns and explosions like it's a battlefield. Then watch the National Guard deploy, since that's too much for the SWAT team to handle.
        • Why would you want to do such a thing, just to fuck up an attempt to detect & prevent crime which is new, effective, and AFAIK has virtually NO negative consequences for civil liberties, privacy etc? (So long as they're sited by an algorithm running on data about gun crime, rather than (say) ethnicity or income levels.)

  • A way of identifying all those people who soil themselves!

    I believe it's safe to say that using someone's gait to determine their relative guilt/innocence, ranks right up there with dumping a woman in a river to see if she's a witch.

    • I believe it's safe to say that using someone's gait to determine their relative guilt/innocence, ranks right up there with dumping a woman in a river to see if she's a witch.
      On the plus side, though, it will give the police an excuse to harass anyone with a handicap or who has a sprained ankle. I think we can all agree that would be totally awesome.

    • Re:Finally! (Score:5, Funny)

      by omeomi (675045) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:28AM (#18502697) Homepage
      They should find some way to incorporate Phrenology [wikipedia.org] into the system.

      • Re:Finally! (Score:5, Funny)

        by smellsofbikes (890263) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @12:41PM (#18503741) Journal
        If phrenology is the forecasting of someone's personality by looking at the bumps on the person's head, how about phrenotherapy: behavior modification by adding bumps to someone's head. I think the people authorizing this sort of wide-spread spying are obvious candidates for phrenotheraputic treatments.

        I wonder how they'll classify me, given that I have an irrational aversion to stepping on cracks (which means I often don't have a regular pace.) Probably 'loser geek' but I might get 'hiding something: investigate!'

    • Re:Finally! (Score:5, Funny)

      by Skyshadow (508) * on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:33AM (#18502755) Homepage
      I dunno about a witch identification, but I'm betting this thing could pretty easily spot the Walk of Shame. Head down? Check. Shuffling gait? Check. Obviously yesterday's clothes wrinkled from a night on the floor? Oh yeah.

      In fact, I can think of a number of amusing things this could watch for: The 'ol Toilet Twostep, the Hemroid Hobble, the Slow-Up-Your-Walk-to-Stay-Behind-the-Chick-with-th e-Smokin'-Hot-Ass Walk (oh, sure, pretend you've never done it). I dunno if it'll prevent terrorism, mind you, but it'll keep those "funny video" TV shows in material for ages.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Irvu (248207)
      Given that this will probably lead to hauling people in based upon spotty clues such as gait, fingerprinting them and taking DNA Samples (never to be destroyed) and then prosecuting a handful for "Failure to Obey" or some other nonsense statute thus clogging the courts with stupid cases this ranks more up there with setting someone on fire to see if their innocence will protect them.

      The article is right. At best, high-tech CCTV has been used to identify people after the fact, in some cases but has done not

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Maxo-Texas (864189)
          And I believe the member of the public who turned them in was islamic. I salute that person for being a good citizen and for not supporting the perpetrators by remaining silent.
  • Why not go the whole hog and have microphones attached to cameras or embedded in street lights?

    Don't give them ideas.

      • Re:The last thing you want to do! (Score:5, Insightful)

        by voice_of_all_reason (926702) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @12:02PM (#18503147)
        It would of course, be mandatory to display your card on the front of any clothing you're wearing

        A capital idea, my good fellow! Perhaps we can even snaz it up a little to make it not so drab. I'm partial to yellow myself. And give them funny shapes? I've always liked that one old western sheriffs wore...

  • More interested in those that don't walk (Score:4, Interesting)

    by solevita (967690) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:16AM (#18502519)
    As part of efforts to instil a sense of transparency into the CCTV society, a special couple of days were undertaken by the camera operators in the Welsh capital Cardiff. Under the scheme members of the public could come in and watch CCTV operators at work.

    I've seen a conference paper based upon the insight this scheme provided. The conclusion? CCTV operators are presently trained to concentrate on those people that aren't moving; standing still is regarded as suspicious.

    I don't know what impact this new technology will have on this practice.

    • Fascinating. In that case, if I ever need to set off a dirty-pipes bomb in central London, I will be sure to continue walking as I reach for the little red PTM switch.

      Am I paranoid for seriously considering the implications of posting such a sentence? Or is it just another result of the totalitarian shithole that this country has become?

  • If you're part of the Ministry of Silly Walks, you're going to get outed.

  • Microphones are already in place, thank you. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by twitter (104583) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:18AM (#18502551) Homepage Journal

    Why not go the whole hog and have microphones attached to cameras or embedded in street lights?'"

    Why go through that kind of expense when cell phones can already be used that way? Cell phones are always in hearing range and can be programmed to be on when they look off. The cameras would increase coverage, but again private "security cameras" will do the job in all the places people care about if access is granted by law to government. Soon enough, people will want cameras in their "smart" houses to turn on and off lights and listen for commands. As long as non free software is used for this, the coverage will be complete.

    Quiet, casual voice, "We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness."

    Love,
    Big Brother

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Reziac (43301) *
      It wouldn't matter if the cellphones all ran OSS; if the chips were hardcoded to be ON all the time you'd still be monitorable. Most particularly if "always on" and GPS were required by gov't regulation. You could be eavesdropped and tracked any time someone felt the urge, and whether the software used was OSS or not would be irrelevant.

      Unfortunately I think that's the direction it's headed; Treach^H^H^H^H Trusted Computing will lead to Trusted Phones with the same TC "security" features, because without a

      • Re:Microphones are already in place, thank you. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by meringuoid (568297) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @01:06PM (#18504191)
        The truth is a perfectly surveyed world is a damn good idea, it's only a bad idea when human beings are at the helm.

        It's only a bad idea if there is a helm. If there's a camera in every room, if everyone can be watched at any time, and if anyone can tune in to any camera at will, that would be fair. If, however, there's a class of bosses who can watch anyone they please, while not being watched themselves, then you have tyranny.

  • "Why not go the whole hog and have microphones attached to cameras or embedded in street lights?"

    Whole hog would be more along the lines of drawing from a page in hitler's book, where we train our children to turn us in as soon as we bitch about the current administration...

    "Yes, Lead Teacher, that's right - my Father said the Prime Minister has lemons for testicles and pees sitting down."

  • I'll let V say it for me. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rantingkitten (938138) <kitten&mirrorshades,org> on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:28AM (#18502693) Homepage
    Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn't be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the now high chancellor, Adam Sutler. He promised you order, he promised you peace, and all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent.

  • May not be a bad thing (Score:4, Informative)

    by abhikhurana (325468) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:34AM (#18502775)
    This technology has been around for some time now and has been tested successfully in many instances. Contrary to the impression this article gives, the technology came from US and Israel, where it was successfully used for border surveillance and also for protecting airports and railways, infrastructure crtical for teh working of a company. This is reflected in the companies working on this technology, namely Object Video [objectvideo.com], IoImage [ioimage.com] etc. But lately UK has become very active in this and like with most surveillance technologies, it has surpassed the rest of the world [coe.co.uk] but the applications that UK is looking at are not all 1984ish. One of the biggest applications which is being looked in UK is to alart the CCTV operators when a car parks in the hard shoulder for more than say 5 minutes and automatically alert highway patrols. This is potentially very useful. I am not sure about the rest of the people here but I have spent hours on the roadside with a punctured tire in really cold weather on more than one occasion (on for those are wondering why I didn't use the spare, try changing a driver's side tyre with all the big trucks passing within a feet or so of you and you will know) and I think it would have been great if help had come sooner. So like all technology, the technology itself is not bad. But you can use in both constructive and destructive way.

  • More costs, no gauranteed benfit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Jtheletter (686279) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:35AM (#18502785)
    This is one of the biggest problems I see with current governments' agendas to implement mass surveilance and other technology security measures - an almost total lack of cost-benefit analysis that demonstrate a clear need to implement the technology. For many of these cases there are clear privacy concerns, the potential for abuse of the system, and encroachment of liberties, and in addition there are the projected costs of implementing the systems - costs for hardware, software, infrastructure, agencies, staffing, etc. Most of the time the monetary estimates run into the billions, and that's before the usual reality of budget and schedule overruns, unforeseen implementation problems, contractor cost inflating, etc etc. And yet to balance all these costs, projected and real, there is usually not much more supporting argument than "it fights terrorism/crime/think of the children". Rarely with any sort of hard data backing up the plans, rarely with in-depth studies of test cases, or even analysis of how similar systems are working in other countries where they have already been implemented. This whole idea of "trust us, it's for the better" is infuriating coming from our chosen leaders.

    And what about if the system doesn't provide the expected benefits? When was the last time a huge security program was dismantled when shown to not deliver what was promised, or even evaluated for success? (programs like Carnivore and Total Information Awareness continue on in other guises even now) Too often there are earmarks, kickbacks (monetary and political) and whatnot tied into the whole process so supporters are even less likely to admit failure when a program is still personally lucrative in some way. None of the funding for these mass surveilance and automated security measures seem to have any sort of merit-based budgeting built in. It ends up being a huge political fight to close useless programs, meanwhile the costs - monetary and liberty - continue to pile up, restricting freedoms and draining our public coffers (or in the case of the US continuing to pile onto a mountain of debt that cannot possibly be repaid without massive negative consequences). Our representatives in government need to be held accountable to hold these programs accountable! There need to be provisions, milestones, evaluations and hard-set sunset clauses that force these programs to deliver or die. And there needs to be more scepticism upfront with regard to the promised benefits that have little to no factual backing, and more than that, the coefficient placed in front of the value of infractions of liberty needs to be increased! The practice of implementing Security Theater programs with no accountability to success has got to stop. We're stepping on freedoms and spending like a drunk with no proven returns, how is that good public policy?

  • Going too far? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by hindumagic (232591) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:36AM (#18502799)
    Really, if the Bad People (TM) want to make modern society grind to a halt, all they have to do now is start to leave shopping bags and other, random containers lying around in public places. It would be pretty effective in making this kind of technology useless, and quite a drain on the system, if you get enough volume of bags being left behind in random public places.

    Sometimes the most simple things can bring to a halt the most complex of systems. No need for anything dangerous, society will bankrupt itself trying to oversee and purify itself.

  • No more random walks (Score:3, Insightful)

    by metoc (224422) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:43AM (#18502881)
    In an airport situation, I could see the cameras tracking you from the checkin counter to your gate. As soon as you identified yourself to a person or kiosk it would know where you should be going and watch you if you strayed. It would also notice things like people who meet and talk but did not arrive together or leave together. On city streets it would look for cars and people, and start to build correlation databases (i.e. Mrs. X's son always visits on Sundays).

    Get used to it. The technology is only going to get smarter, and eventually the street lights will know where you are going and change accordingly. When you deviate it will issue and alert and require you to file a report.

    I personally have no problem being watched as long as I can watch back. It would be interesting to know where the politicians are at 2 AM.

  • whole hog (Score:3, Insightful)

    by nurb432 (527695) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:44AM (#18502889) Homepage Journal
    Why stop at every streetlight? Lets just mandate implants for everyone, and a worldwide sensor network, and get it over with.

  • I've long realized that I recognize people I know well from a _distance_ more by how they move than by the shape of their face or other more 'normal' visual cues. It probably comes from evolving in an area where predators moved differently from prey.

  • Thought crime (Score:5, Insightful)

    by AmiMoJo (196126) <mojo@wDEBIANorld3.net minus distro> on Tuesday March 27 2007, @12:08PM (#18503227) Homepage
    Surely this is an actual, real world example of thought crime being punished? No longer do you actually have to comit a crime - simply acting like you might comit some, thinging about it, planning it in some way, or suggesting it to others is now a crime.

  • I should just turn myself in (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MrP-(at work) (839979) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @12:17PM (#18503359)
    I have social anxiety, whenever I go to a store (rarely) I get all jumpy and paranoid. Sales people are always watching me, probably thinking I'm going to steal something

    This is one reason I'm sure I'll never fly, I'd be way freaked out at an airport.

    Oh well, if this ever comes to the states I guess I can become a complete hermit.

    • Gaitcrime! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Tackhead (54550) on Tuesday March 27 2007, @11:28AM (#18502691)
      > All this does is make it easier for them to peg you as a terrorist for no reason other than because the cameras say so.

      Not terrorism, facecrime... Or in this case, gaitcrime.

      "It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away. A nervous tic, an unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself, anything that carried with it the suggestion of abnormality, of having something to hide. In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face, was itself a punishable offense. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: facecrime"

      - Orwell, 1984

      • I worked on gait recognition a little a few years ago. It's not about spotting people's attitudes or thought by their walk. It's based on the theory that gait is a biometric, like a fingerprint. This has yet to be conclusively proven.

        You then measure the gait of an individual comitting a crime (in the case where footage does not reveal the face clearly) and use it, fingerprint like, to identify suspects.

        This is not 1984. This is not big brother.

        What IS big brother like is the proliferation of cameras, regar

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by *weasel (174362)
      Why should that matter?
      If the crime keeps happening at the same rate, how can you possibly justify the expense of the system?

      Suppose the cameras and the prosecution bear out 100% capture and conviction rate ... and crime keeps happening at the exact same rate it ever did.

      What have the cameras bought you in terms of security, if you're still just as likely to be mugged walking down the street?

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by badfish99 (826052)
        Bear in mind that the people selling these cameras are skilled professional salesmen, but the people buying them are local politicians, which requires no special education or training.
        If the crime rate goes down when cameras are installed, the sales pitch will be "cameras reduce crime". If it goes up, the pitch will be "more cameras are needed to combat rising crime".
        The expense will not be an issue, so long as it is only a small proportion of the money raised by taxes for other things. And if anyone ra

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Grishnakh (216268)
        How about we go back to the way the police used to work, where they patrolled the streets and deterred or stopped crime in the first place?

        Or maybe you should go back to the way society used to work, where people were allowed to defend themselves against attackers and criminals, and were even allowed to carry weapons around for this purpose?

        Unfortunately, today in the UK, you'll be prosecuted for attempting to defend yourself in any way against a criminal, especially if you hurt him, or even just threaten h

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by 2short (466733)
      "Imagine for instance that security officials are looking to see if there are any of 10,000 known criminal/terrorists at the superbowl. That's not gonna be done by looking at everybody's faces. But automated walk recognition might be a really nice option."

      OK, and let's say the technology is just fabulously better than it seems like it will ever get, and matches people correctly 99.99% of the time. Using such a fictionally wonderful system to search for your proposed 10,000 profiles of criminals/terrorists,

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