Homeland Security's Tech Wonders 138
Lucas123 writes "The multi-billion dollar budget of the Department of Homeland Security has spawned a myriad of new, whiz-bang technology that includes things like keychain-size, remote-controlled aerial vehicles designed to collect and transmit data for military and homeland security uses. It also includes infrared cameras that capture license plate images to match them in milliseconds to police records. "Seventy percent of all criminal activity can be tied to a vehicle," says Mark Windover, president of Remington ELSAG Law Enforcement Systems, which is marketing its product to 250 U.S. police agencies."
Thank God we have this technology (Score:5, Insightful)
bureaucratic incompetance is the greatest threat (Score:5, Insightful)
Data is not the same as intelligence (Score:5, Insightful)
Why use humans when you've technology (Score:4, Insightful)
hmmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:bureaucratic incompetance is the greatest threa (Score:2, Insightful)
I like this sentence. It sends me into a trance every time I read it. I think it is because I imagine the DHS trying to perform this research and ironically getting nowhere. Then they try to research why their previous research got nowhere. When that gets nowhere they decide to research why the research of why their previous research got nowhere got nowhere and so on.
Revolution. (Score:0, Insightful)
More than you understand. (Score:5, Insightful)
#1. More terrorists?
#2. More crooked cops?
Now, which of these is this new surveillance technology supposed to protect you from and which ones will have it?
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/conductunbecoming/ [nwsource.com]
Re:hmmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
People come up with nifty toys all the time. It's part of living in a high-tech society. The problem comes in when law-enforcement substitutes ineffective technological measures for quality police work.
Buy Now! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Thank God we have this technology (Score:2, Insightful)
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/index.cfm?newsid=10804 [pcadvisor.co.uk]
i know in my home town that police men on the beat has been completely stopped since the introduction of the blanket cctv coverage in my town but on Friday and Saturday nights shop windows in our high street get smashed and parked cars vandalised, and the drunken fights are now not stopped as no police attend, so who exactly is watching and when the police are approached to obtain footage to find the criminals ppl are always told the camera was facing the wrong way!
they're an excuse for cutbacks in the police force that fail to work and are abused when the are.
the only day i have seen cameras on our sea front move is when there was a rescue day (coast guard ect) and the cameras were pointing out to fecking sea, not watching the crowd!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/check/player/nol/newsid_7000000/newsid_7007400?redirect=7007418.stm&news=1&bbwm=1&bbram=1&nbwm=1&nbram=1 [bbc.co.uk]
They just love their toys, don't they? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:70% bad vehicles (Score:4, Insightful)
Once we are all in chains (Score:3, Insightful)