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spacebanana7 12 hours ago

“Our deployments are intelligence-led and focused on identifying people wanted by the police or courts, including those suspected of serious offences and those who may be breaching bail conditions or court orders”

This is crazy. Could easily be used to track protesters who went to the an event the police didn’t like.

dandaka 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

This is exactly what happened in Moscow after same tech was launched. It is much 'safer' on streets, since every entrance door and traffic intersection is equipped with cameras now.

But I pick Portugal's approach every time — no public cameras, no dashcams, it is forbidden to record private persons in public without permission.

danw1979 11 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I’m in Portugal with kids right now and I can not think of a country where dashcams would be more useful.

The standard of driving and adherence to the law of the roads is some of the worst I’ve encountered in Europe.

I haven’t let go of my 9yo’s hand since we arrived in Porto a few days ago. Speeding is chronic and nobody gives a shit for the safety of you or your children here.

dandaka 9 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Recording everything has a lot of upsides. Unfortunately, downsides for privacy and democracy are very real.

Talking about speeding, not sure. I am driving around Lisbon and speed limit is 50 in city, and lots of speed cameras. Though I am driving at 55 as limit and rarely see anyone going faster than that.

constantius 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You are in a new country and feel that your kid needs protection, which is perfectly human, but does mean that your opinion is a bit biased.

As sibling comments mention, countries exist with many cameras, public or private, where driving feels worse. I didn't look at road deaths, but I'd be surprised if Portugal is among the leading countries on this.

Equally, if you take a bit of distance, you can realise that Portugal has many other parents living there, yet they are not clamouring for more surveillance: it's difficult to imagine that the Portuguese dictatorial government is evilly preventing its people from accessing the benefits of surveillance.

snozolli an hour ago | parent [-]

2024 stats, road accident fatalities, per million inhabitants:

Portugal: 58 Romania (highest in EU): 78 EU overall: 44 Sweden (lowest in EU): 20

https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...

So, depending on where OP is from, Portugal could seem a bit more dangerous or wildly more dangerous than their home county.

wickedsickeune 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

In Greece and Italy they drive at least as bad as in Portugal, if not much worse, and dashcams are perfectly legal.

iamnothere 10 hours ago | parent [-]

I’d also suggest searching for the classic “Russian dashcam videos” on YouTube.

tancop 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

private citizens should be allowed to record anything. make it strictly forbidden for the government and businesses because they have the power and motivation to abuse it, but that risk doesnt really exist for an ordinary person.

dandaka 8 hours ago | parent [-]

Maybe they should. But I think there is a correlation between "private citizens can't record other citizens" and "almost no cameras around". Coming from a country with a lots of cameras (where people record each other as well), this is a very comforting feeling.

zarzavat 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I love the word "including" there. Yes it will be used for people suspected of minor crimes but it also includes people accused serious crimes as well!

kevincox 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This sentence struck me as well. It says what it is focused on, but nothing about what it actually captures.

What I would like to see is something like this:

- The detectors have a per-determined list of suspect faces and only record information when those faces are spotted.

- These detectors keep only a fixed length of recording that is permanently deleted unless it is actively linked to a crime and explicitly held as part of that investigation.

But it says nothing concrete. Just some nonsense about "focus" which doesn't mean anything.

throwayay4929 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Could easily be used to track people who posted something bad on Twitter.

basisword an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

>> Could easily be used to track protesters who went to the an event the police didn’t like.

They've already used facial recognition at protests.

Schiendelman 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Could? Will.

caarven 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

"Could"? Have you seen what they've been doing to protesters?

altacc 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

They're hoping people read this as the nonsense notion that they'll only scan criminal's faces. Reality is that everyone's face will be scanned, processed and stored.