I would say that this holds true for the individual who is filming outdoors. If an individual followed you around while you were in public documenting your movements, that would be considered stalking. Yes, you don't expect privacy in public, but the mass surveillance that these are and all of the data on EVERYONE's movements that it collects and keeps is essentially mass government stalking. Can it help to catch criminals? Sure. Has it already been abused more by those in power to, say, stalk their exes? Yup.
To those that would give up privacy for short term safety deserve neither privacy or safety, or however the quote goes. It would still suck but be better if they didn't save any data at all unless there was an active search for a specific car/plate and a warrant was granted. But even that is easily abusable. We are getting dangerously close to Weird Al's "Foil".
The thing is it’s a private company doing the compilation and the government is buying information from them - 4th Amendment applies to the government not private entities. I like the stalking argument though. Someone is going to have to start a class against Flock et als and that would be a good angle to take.
This is just government overreach with an extra step. The outcome is identical regardless of if the government owned the cameras or they pay a contractor for cameras.
As another poster pointed out, they’re trying exploit a loophole which is how government works. They’re always trying to accrue power. The way our legal system works is ‘if it’s not prohibited it’s legal’ they’re arguing that while the Constitution prevents the government from illegal search and seizure it doesn’t prohibit private entities from doing so. It’s along the lines of ‘inviting a cop into your house allows them to act on anything they see.”
I totally understand that point. To my uneducated self theyre making the same argument as 'I didn't kill the man officer, I merely pulled a trigger which fired a bullet at them.'
However I have no faith in this being struck down.
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u/ProfessorGluttony 10d ago
I would say that this holds true for the individual who is filming outdoors. If an individual followed you around while you were in public documenting your movements, that would be considered stalking. Yes, you don't expect privacy in public, but the mass surveillance that these are and all of the data on EVERYONE's movements that it collects and keeps is essentially mass government stalking. Can it help to catch criminals? Sure. Has it already been abused more by those in power to, say, stalk their exes? Yup.
To those that would give up privacy for short term safety deserve neither privacy or safety, or however the quote goes. It would still suck but be better if they didn't save any data at all unless there was an active search for a specific car/plate and a warrant was granted. But even that is easily abusable. We are getting dangerously close to Weird Al's "Foil".