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by ctoth2 hours ago |
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upvoteby seethishat2 hours ago|
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Until one of them communicates a threat, then it is a criminal matter.
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upvoteby emptybits1 hours ago|
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Perhaps, depending on specific intent, credibility, and the nature of harm threatened.

But since this is about surveillance, I hope that detection of verbal threats is not a goal of government surveillance because it's difficult to imagine how that could be accomplished without significant loss of privacy or other liberties.

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upvoteby saltyoldman1 hours ago|
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I can see it in court now. Our AI monitoring system did indeed know about the threat to the building where 800 people died on Sunday.

It says: " Agent: Voice to text detected: I have everything ready - all the XXX chemicals are ready in the van and I'm going to park in the 900 S Crap St now"

Agent: Thread Level HIGH.

Agent: Looking up local codes.

Agent: Mayor signed SB-1238 in 2026 - no surveillance devices may be used for audio threat determination.

Agent: Threat silenced, but logged.

Judge: Oh, that makes sense. Make sure to bag and tag and bill the families for the bags.

City Employee: We also know who parked the van, should we arrest them.

Judge: No it looks like SB-1238 would forbid us from using this data for the purposes of arrest. I guess send them a thank you letter for testing our laws.

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upvoteby anigbrowl1 hours ago|
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Oh, only 800? Maybe you can pick a larger imaginary number to make me feel really guilty about not wanting to give up my rights to live free of surveillance.
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upvoteby saltyoldman17 minutes ago|
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I mean yeah, but I don't need to. These cameras ARE already the result of 9/11.
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upvoteby emptybits52 minutes ago|
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Appreciate the pushback, saltyoldman. Yes, we want to respond to credible threats. And, as always, courts and law enforcement can invade privacy when there's reason to believe someone is worth surveilling. But we're talking here about widespread, extremely cheap, technically easy surveillance of potentially everyone at all times. That's the endgame that some commercial and government interests have in mind.

Would you agree that sometimes an uptick in theoretical safety is not worth a downtick of definite lost liberties?

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upvoteby saltyoldman22 minutes ago|
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I used to be that way. However more recently I have come to prefer security over privacy, at least where I live. I do want to make sure human, drug and weapon traffickers are not exiting off my freeway ramp. I do get the issues with what you're saying, but let's think of ways to have both. The existence of a surveillance net with safegards. In other words yes let's have the conversation to make our country secure and also prosecute sherrifs spying on their girlfriends, make sure no API hole exists and some company isn't selling billions worth of data to China.
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upvoteby ryeats1 hours ago|
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This is essentially the Trolley Problem.
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upvoteby stickfigure1 hours ago|
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I don't think you're advocating to have our personal conversations continuously monitored whenever outside, but in the context of this thread, that's what it sounds like.
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upvoteby nightpool19 minutes ago|
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No, in the context of the thread it sounds like they're illustrating myrmidon's point about how the selective enforcement of crimes that are easy to catch on camera means that the police have less time (and less inclination, training, norms) for addressing more serious crimes, like interpersonal violence.

More broadly, they're not saying that we should make the cameras better to catch more crime, they're saying that when you make cameras the main way you catch crime, you shift the social definition of what crime is to "what cameras can catch".

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