Each day, the Chula Vista police respond to as many as 15 emergency calls with a drone, launching more than 4,100 flights since the program began two years ago. Chula Vista, a Southern California city with a population of 270,000, is the first in the country to adopt such a program, called Drone as First Responder.
That newfound automation, however, raises civil liberties concerns, especially as drones gain the power to track vehicles and people automatically. As the police use more drones, they could collect and store more video of life in the city, which could remove any expectation of privacy once you leave the home.
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I get the concerns - and the straight safety concerns about them falling out of the sky...
But, I also can see tremendous value in being able to deploy one to investigate/follow once a call has been made.
Our office is several hundred yards from a police station. Our response time is about 20 minutes. At least, if there was a drone, in theory, they’d be able to follow the homeless degenerate causing problems.
Of course, they’d still have to be willing to arrest said degenerate.
Pardon the interruption (miss the old thread-jack emoji)....
I am still mulling this story, about the police in Jackson, MS live-streaming video from residential Amazon Ring doorbell cams. It appears to be opt-in/volunteer, but we all know that volunteered has a way of becoming voluntold. At first blush (as you might guess) it sits poorly with me, but I'm trying not to get wound up for nothing. I have the election for that.
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The privacy issues have for the most part already been settled - the courts have said that air space is a public space, and thus anything that can be seen from there is fair game. The case that specifically comes to mind involved a guy who built really tall fences around his property to hide his marijuana grow. This worked, for anyone at ground level. Police got themselves some time in a flying machine, and took pictures with a long lens, then used the photos to get a search warrant. Courts said that air space is public space, and thus there is no expectation of privacy from someone in a plane or other flying machine.
There's also the case of the aerial photography of Barbara Streisand's beach property.
Langenator wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 1:37 am
The privacy issues have for the most part already been settled - the courts have said that air space is a public space, and thus anything that can be seen from there is fair game. The case that specifically comes to mind involved a guy who built really tall fences around his property to hide his marijuana grow. This worked, for anyone at ground level. Police got themselves some time in a flying machine, and took pictures with a long lens, then used the photos to get a search warrant. Courts said that air space is public space, and thus there is no expectation of privacy from someone in a plane or other flying machine.
There's also the case of the aerial photography of Barbara Streisand's beach property.
so if I know where a nudist camp is and fly my drone overhead at say 50 feet about the pool, taking pictures that is perfectly cool?
How about if I know my neighbors like to leave their curtains and blinds open in their third story window behind a row of trees and they like to have sex that way. Drone on their property is no issue?
or is their an issue once you cross the property line?
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Netpackrat wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 2:22 am
I suppose that works both ways; if you are recording with your done, and their naked toddler walks into view, you are now a child pornographer.
You’re forgetting that there are two sets of rules for the ruling class vs the peasants...
The end users wishes are irrelevant - all video recorded is property of Amazon, and their policy is to give access to any of that requests it. The sad part is it doesn't matter if you don't have one, they've become so ubiquitous, that your street is probably covered - I wouldn't use one of you gave it to me, but a neighbor two doors down has one..
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