Smile, you're on security camera

[wdlove]

What would the Sons of Liberty say? Boston's main streets are filled with hidden eyes.

By John McElhenny, Globe Correspondent, 3/28/2004

Private detective Rob Selevitch has been wearing out shoe leather in Boston for 25 years, interviewing witnesses and scouring crime scenes. Lately that task has been easier for one simple reason: Video cameras capture many of the city's comings and goings 24/7.

"Tell me any place, and I guarantee you there's a camera there somewhere," says Selevitch, president of the security company CEI Management Corp. and founder of the website http://www.bostondetective.com, which represents a consortium of licensed professional investigators in the Boston area. "If you want to get technical about it, you're pretty much under surveillance all the time."

Video surveillance has taken off in recent years, thanks to smaller, less obtrusive cameras and rising security concerns since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Customers at banks, retail stores, and other businesses have long been filmed in an attempt to thwart crimes and solve them once they occur, but in recent years, camera surveillance has also made inroads at places such as churches, parking garages, and supermarkets, Selevitch says.http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/088/city/Smile_you_re_on_security_camera+.shtml

 

[rainman::|:|]

What would the Sons of Liberty say? Boston's main streets are filled with hidden eyes.

By John McElhenny, Globe Correspondent, 3/28/2004

Private detective Rob Selevitch has been wearing out shoe leather in Boston for 25 years, interviewing witnesses and scouring crime scenes. Lately that task has been easier for one simple reason: Video cameras capture many of the city's comings and goings 24/7.

"Tell me any place, and I guarantee you there's a camera there somewhere," says Selevitch, president of the security company CEI Management Corp. and founder of the website http://www.bostondetective.com, which represents a consortium of licensed professional investigators in the Boston area. "If you want to get technical about it, you're pretty much under surveillance all the time."

Video surveillance has taken off in recent years, thanks to smaller, less obtrusive cameras and rising security concerns since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Customers at banks, retail stores, and other businesses have long been filmed in an attempt to thwart crimes and solve them once they occur, but in recent years, camera surveillance has also made inroads at places such as churches, parking garages, and supermarkets, Selevitch says.http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/088/city/Smile_you_re_on_security_camera+.shtml

i try really, really hard not to think about the fact that i'm nearly always being recorded... because it really, really bothers me. i mean, i go to a bank, i expect to be on camera. Maybe the DMV as well. but a library? coffee shop? a sidewalk??? it's unreal. i was at some friends' house a few weeks ago, and they admitted to having cameras (and mics) all over the exterior of their home, which is creepy. when my partner and i stood chatting, waiting for them to answer the door, they heard every word i said-- which, blissfully, was not about them

paul

 

[Hemingray]

Yeah, it's sorta creepy, but then again, if you're doing nothing wrong, is there really anything to be worried about? If you're one of the millions of people on camera in any given day, I doubt a guy behind a monitor is going to pinpoint you and stalk you the rest of your life... maybe they should put HIM on a surveilance camera. Big Brother's got a Dad, after all.

 

[voicegy]

I vote that arn creates a sticky link called "News from Boston:Brought to You by wdlove".

 

[Makosuke]

Yeah, it's sorta creepy, but then again, if you're doing nothing wrong, is there really anything to be worried about?

Generally true, but that leaves out two issues:

The big one is, what happens when doing something right is "doing something wrong"? Example: The underground railroad was formed by people who helped slaves escape to freedom. It was also technically illegal at the time. If there had been "universal security" 150 years ago, would *anybody* have escaped to the North?

And for that matter, what happens when somebody decides to use all that knowledge for ill. Nixon had no problems telling the FBI to follow political enemies around and wiretap them, and he'd have been that much more dangerous had he had access to the pervasive security systems around today.

Sorry, but as bad as crime and injustice is, I'll take freedom at the cost of a little of it.

(Although I must admit, it really annoys me when people get worked up about security cameras in a very reasonable place; there is a camera looking at a pedestrian path under a bridge near the campus I work at. It's been vandalized probably a half dozen times since it was installed. People probably assume it's to stop the graffiti artists that favor the walls down there, or to pressure people who go down there to sell pot, but I'd bet it's really intended to reduce the number of rapes in what is easily the most concealed and vulnerable place for a woman to be walking at night--lots of places to hide, nobody nearby to hear you scream. Be reasonable, but not paranoid.)

 

[Sun Baked]

In other words, the back seat of a car isn't less expensive than a hotel room.

Unless you don't like getting paid for the videos you are starring in.

 

[MrMacMan]

Whenever I see a security camera I wave at it making weird faced...


In Time Squar alone in 1998 there were this many cameras (it has now since tripled)

Heck there is even a NYC tour of these cameras!


Its just frikken crazy.

 

[rainman::|:|]

the way cameras are now, divided and run by countless companies and organizations, they're not a recognizable threat. To find you, they must work backwards, getting video/images from numerous sources. still, it's an invasion of privacy, i think... when you're walking down the street, you have (the well-established) practical obscurity on your side-- there can only be so many other pedestrians to see. but, with cameras, that's removed, and there's no telling how many people see your face.

but the real threat is coming: facial recognition, and a subsequent government network. You can be tracked, in real-time, anywhere in the country, except (hopefully) your own home. every single place you go, and thing you do, can be tracked automatically by computers, without human intervention. i don't like this at all. and of course, advertising can only follow: you can be manipulated by corporations in entirely new ways, with targeted messages appearing around you, on your devices...

paul

 

[AngryLawnGnome]

I spy on everyone, so I have no problem with cameras.

 

[wdlove]

I vote that arn creates a sticky link called "News from Boston:Brought to You by wdlove".

Thank you voicegy, that would be awesome. The only problem is that I'm just a member like anyone else and don't deserve special treatment. It is a nice thought though.

My thought on this article was that the DNC convention goers don't realize that they will be under supervision also. Smile, "your on candid camera."

 

[adamjay]

i just noticed last week that my landlord installed a Surveillance camera above the front door to my apartment building.

its a 4 unit apartment building. 2 ground level units, with a door inbetween them leading to a stairway to the 2 second-level units. The camera is right above that door. and since there's a series of steps before you get to that door, all tenants are under surveillance when entering or leaving the building. i dont even know what his damage is. its a historical neighborhood (brick road and all of that), last year he put the biggest eye-soar chainlink fence up, in a neighborhood that has no fences at all.

Whatever happened to just asking your tenants how things are, you know checking the 'beat'. and i could understand if it was a 50 unit apartment building but 4 units!?!?

i say the world is full of control freaks, and a control freak with an extra hundred bucks burning a hole in their pocket can soon become a control freak watching you live on tv.

 

[ExoticFish]

i think cameras are good... when they're in a bank or other such places where security is an issue... i'd rather not have a camera watching me as i scratch that itch i had on my butt while i was walking down the street.

 

[Thomas Veil]

Coming to your town soon:

 

[Golem]

Coming to your town soon:

Took Me a second to click to the reference , Still their is;nt too many TV shows with a no 2's residence.

 

[ffactory]

let's play a game

everybody draw a map of their neighborhood with Xs for all the cameras, limit of 2-block radius... the one with the highest per-block saturation wins a new G5 AuPB from Arn!! seriously though, am i the only one thinking of 'Enemy of the State'? i saw the same globe article the other day & it sent shivers down my spine. call me paranoid, but i can sometimes identify with the kids who wear masks at protests....

Robert Clayton Dean: Why are they after me?
Brill: You have something they want.
Robert Clayton Dean: I don't have anything.
Brill: Maybe you do and you don't know it.
​

 

[MongoTheGeek]

Welcome to small town America. If I wanted to know anything about my neighbors, who is shacking up with whom, who's a drunk, who's a wife beater, who changes into his wife's dress I just ask. Everyone who cares knows everyones business.

It's a lot more dangerous to privacy than a million and one cameras. The reason why there wasn't a basic right to privacy explicit in the constitution, 200 years ago no one had it. The best they could hope for is saying you have a right to keep people off of your own property(and that has been eroded over the years)

Besides maybe cameras will bring back face masks as a fashion statement.

 

[jsw]

As paulwhannel pointed out, there are so many different operators that no one person can watch you go about your day-to-day life. Everyone sees just a piece of it, and 99% of those cameras merely tape - they aren't manned.

It's a good thing, when crimes are committed, to be able to request tapes of certain places and times.

So, for now, I'm cool with it. I think the crime-solving ability is more goood than the invasion of privay is bad, again because almost none of the footage is ever seen, and when it is, it's footage of public places, so presumably you're not doing anything TOO embarrassing. I mean, if you're going at it in a car, you;d probably at least have the common sense to steam up the windows first.

But I also worry about what's coming. I hate being tracked, and I start to fail to see the cost benefit advantage.

Sady, though, it's coming. Legally or not, the technology is too easily obtained to expect that, 20 years from now, someone couldn't follow you from your door to where you go and back, one camera at a time. It doesn't really scame me, but I worry about my daughter (when she's older) and other women who might more easily be stalked and targetted.

 

[MongoTheGeek]

But I also worry about what's coming. I hate being tracked, and I start to fail to see the cost benefit advantage.

Sady, though, it's coming. Legally or not, the technology is too easily obtained to expect that, 20 years from now, someone couldn't follow you from your door to where you go and back, one camera at a time. It doesn't really scame me, but I worry about my daughter (when she's older) and other women who might more easily be stalked and targetted.

I know what you mean. I don't have a daughter and my son is of an age and stature where he is more likely to cause trouble than receive it but I still worry.

How would people feel about the general population carrying around cameras to record everything they see? Is there a difference between that and stationary ones?

 

[jsw]

How would people feel about the general population carrying around cameras to record everything they see? Is there a difference between that and stationary ones?

To an extent, that's true now. In a generation or two of mobile phones, a vast portion of the public will carry what amounts to a video camera around with them 24/7. That doesn't bother me so much, though. It's usually obvious when a cellphone is aimed at you at any range where the video would show much, and my big concern - anonymous stalkers who use the Internet - aren't going to see all those phone videos.

Probably.

 

[Hemingray]

Coming to your town soon:

HeheeheeYES! A fellow Prisoner fan.

Be seeing you.

 

[MillieWales]

How would people feel about the general population carrying around cameras to record everything they see? Is there a difference between that and stationary ones?

I live in the UK, and at the weekend went to a shopping mall in a place called Southampton. Not a Mall like you have in the states, tiny in comparison, but big for us. There are, of course, cameras everywhere, but you don't notice, you just shop.

There were 2 Asian tourists. One was taking a phot of the other next to a railing overlooking the centre of the Mall. A security guard ran over and said 'that will be the last picture you take in here, if you take any more I am calling the Police and will get them to confiscate your equipment.' Now, maybe they were terrorists planning where to plant the bomb, maybe they are Mall designers stealing ideas, but I guess they were probably on holiday and trying to have a good time. I wondered why he was so over the top, why he was lieing - I really doubt you could even call the Police, let alone get them to confiscate anyhting - and also if he would have been so agressive and paranoid if they were European tourists. So it is fine for them to film us doing our daily routines, but not for us to take a picture of them.... The best bit was they had no idea what he was going on about or why, so in the end he just looked very stupid to all the rather surprised shoppers.

Maybe he was just bored and was trying to pass the time. Sorry for going off topic.

Marc

 

[MrMacMan]

Security is too over the top.

Arg, so stupid everything really is.


Security meaures are over the top for no reason at all.

 

[caveman_uk]

I live in the UK, and at the weekend went to a shopping mall in a place called Southampton. Not a Mall like you have in the states, tiny in comparison, but big for us. There are, of course, cameras everywhere, but you don't notice, you just shop.

There were 2 Asian tourists. One was taking a phot of the other next to a railing overlooking the centre of the Mall. A security guard ran over and said 'that will be the last picture you take in here, if you take any more I am calling the Police and will get them to confiscate your equipment.'

My response would be 'Yeah, go on. Call them. I'd be pleased to see them. I guess they'll less pleased with you wasting their time.'