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bix6 8 hours ago

Surreal in what way?

Edit: thanks for the downvotes? Genuinely curious on GPs experience.

jkahrs595 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

In what way is going through a military/police checkpoint while driving ordinary?

bix6 7 hours ago | parent [-]

I don’t live in Texas but I thought they ran checkpoints like that near the border already? I was told to avoid the most southern zones when I drove cross country years ago.

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

Surreal in the way that your constitutional rights are being casually violated?

Manuel_D 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The Constitution does not prohibit government (or anyone for that matter) from recording people in public spaces. ALPRs have been in widespread use since the 90s, I am continuously puzzled where people get the idea that this is new technology.

text0404 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

ALPRs weren't connected to companies which call their detractors "terrorists" and which collect photographs into searchable databases that have advanced AI features. The general public has also witnessed the rise of military-style policing and unaccountable violence from law enforcement, so that contributes to the negative sentiment.

Manuel_D 6 hours ago | parent [-]

ALPRs were always fed into databases, even back during the 90s. The whole point of ALPRs is to automate the task of reading license plates.

text0404 6 hours ago | parent [-]

They weren't connected to nationwide databases which automatically record, store, and aggregate individuals' movements. Not constitutionally equivalent.

5 hours ago | parent | next [-]
[deleted]
Manuel_D 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Uh huh, and? When did the supreme court decide that ALPR data becomes a search the moment it gets logged to a database?

text0404 5 hours ago | parent [-]

They haven't yet because a case hasn't made its way to the SC. But Chatrie and Carpenter deal with this exact subject matter and both establish that aggregating and searching past data is a (fourth amendment) search.

Manuel_D 5 hours ago | parent [-]

No, for the fifth time, Chatrie and Carpenter dealt with private cell phone location information. This is not the exact same subject matter at all.

text0404 5 hours ago | parent [-]

The specific technology being used to conduct the searches does not matter.

Persistent technological tracking of a person's public movements can constitute a search. The fact that each individual movement occurs in public does not automatically eliminate fourth amendment protection, nor does it matter that its a third party that does the collecting (Google, Flock, whoever). What matters is that LE is conducting fourth amendment searches using that data.

Manuel_D 5 hours ago | parent [-]

It's not just the specific technology being used to conduct the search, it's that the information the police obtained Chatrie and in Carpender both included people's private movements. Your phone's GPS data doesn't just track where you drive on public roads, it also tracks you walking around your private property.

> The fact that each individual movement occurs in public does not automatically eliminate fourth amendment protection, nor does it matter that its a third party that does the collecting (Google, Flock, whoever).

Sure, doesn't eliminate Fourth Amendment protections: the police can't just search your car because it's in public. But that doesn't meant police can't record public spaces.

> What matters is that LE is conducting fourth amendment searches using that data.

Recording public spaces isn't a Fourth Amendment search. That's what distinguishes Flock from the other cases you mentioned.

text0404 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Carpenter is saying that public movements are part of the protected interest, not just the private movements which were also tracked. If the private movements hadn't been tracked in those cases, it would still be a 4A issue:

"A person does not surrender all Fourth Amendment protection by venturing into the public sphere. To the contrary, 'what [one] seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected.'"

> But that doesn't meant police can't record public spaces.

> Recording public spaces isn't a Fourth Amendment search.

I'm not saying either of these things. The quote that you're responding to literally says "What matters is that LE is conducting fourth amendment searches using that data". I don't care who collects the data (Flock, or Axon, or Google, or whoever): if the cops are searching a persistent database which monitors and tracks people over time, it is a 4A issue.

Manuel_D 3 hours ago | parent [-]

This is just an incorrect description of the ruling in Carpenter v. US. The core of the ruling is that the third-party doctrine doesn't apply to cell phone location data. The ruling was a very narrow one and did not affect other methods of monitoring.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpenter_v._United_States

> The Supreme Court's ruling in Carpenter was narrow and did not otherwise change the third-party doctrine related to other business records that might incidentally reveal location information, nor did it overrule prior decisions concerning conventional surveillance techniques and tools such as security cameras.

You're trying to expand the scope of the decision on Carpenter to encompasses video cameras, or location tracking in general, but that is not true.

> The quote that you're responding to literally says "What matters is that LE is conducting fourth amendment searches using that data".

No, it does not. It says that public activity may be protected, not that it is protected. And you're conveniently ignoring the fact that this decision was narrowly scoped to the context of phone location data.

> if the cops are searching a persistent database which monitors and tracks people over time, it is a 4A issue.

Carpenter only established this in the context of phone location information. You're inventing your own decision when you try to expand this to public facing cameras.

text0404 2 hours ago | parent [-]

I'm not talking about the specific ruling, I'm quoting the justification that the justices used in coming to that ruling, which is extremely relevant to modern day surveillance and whether LE using surveillance cameras from a third party to reconstruct people's movements constitutes unreasonable searches under 4A. Based on their arguments, it appears so.

> nor did it overrule prior decisions

I'm not saying it overruled prior decisions. I'm saying the reasoning of the judges has an effect on future surveillance technologies.

> You're trying to expand the scope of the decision on Carpenter to encompasses video cameras, or location tracking in general, but that is not true.

No, I'm saying that the same principles that led to the outcome of Carpenter also apply to technologically-assisted tracking (which includes LE using surveillance cameras to track movements over time).

Manuel_D 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> No, I'm saying that the same principles that led to the outcome of Carpenter also apply to technologically-assisted tracking (which includes LE using surveillance cameras to track movements over time).

And this is just a factually wrong statement about the Carpenter decision. The Supreme Court didn't apply the same principles to other methods of surveillance. They could have. But they did not, and instead gave a narrowly scoped decision that was limited to cell phone location data.

What you think the Supreme Court should have decided is irrelevant.

apercu 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The constitution was written centuries ago and its authors expected the founding documents to be routinely updated.

mrtesthah 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Notice that the person I responded to was speaking about a military checkpoint near the border. Do you know what that is?

Manuel_D 6 hours ago | parent [-]

If anything that makes surveillance even less noteworthy. Is it really surprising that a military installation has surveillance?

pseudalopex 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

They did not say installation.

Manuel_D 6 hours ago | parent [-]

A checkpoint is a type of military installation. Specifically an installation with the purpose of monitoring and controlling traffic traveling through the checkpoint.

pseudalopex 3 hours ago | parent [-]

A check point is a point where people or things are checked. It could be military or civilian. It could be permanent or temporary. It could be 1 person and a vehicle parked in a road. This would not be a military installation to most people. Or dictionaries. Or laws.

Manuel_D 2 hours ago | parent [-]

And the point remains, regardless of semantic quibbling: a checkpoint is probably the least surprising place to encounter surveillance. Arguably, it's the whole point of a checkpoint to surveil, "checking" in your terminology, who's passing through.

apercu 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I was on a public highway.

bix6 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Please see my reply to the other response

apercu 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Surreal in that I’ve only dealt with that sort of thing (army checkpoints) in places that have active armed military conflicts.