Posted: Sunday, September 28, 2008 12:00 am
Last year in Britain, the BBC reported on a new development in public health and safety: Surveillance cameras that not only spot trouble but also admonish the culprits to straighten up.
If the camera sees somebody throw litter in the street, it can be made to say: "Hey, what are you doing? Better pick that up."
Once this gets going, there will be no escaping either the surveillance, which in Britain is even more widespread than in Oregon, or the government's nagging voice.
This is of interest in Oregon because even though everybody says it's not the plan, red-light cameras in use in Albany and elsewhere could be used for more extensive surveillance as well.
Redflex, the Australian company that supplies most of the red-light cameras in Oregon including Albany's, is reported to have developed a system that can use the cameras for other applications such as checking traffic for stolen cars or kidnapped children.
The Oregon law authorizing red-light cameras is explicit in saying they can be used only to enforce the law against ignoring traffic-control devices. But the cameras are capable of a lot more. They can check on vehicles' speed, the police say. They are also always on. They record only 12 seconds \in case of red-light violations, but the if the storage capacity was there in servers, they could record and store in databases everything that happens within their view around the clock.
All of this could make certain kinds of criminals easier to catch, especially if the cameras were distributed more evenly. And the law in Oregon now no longer limits the number of such cameras used for red-light enforcement.
Suppose your car is missing when you go out to head for work. You call it in, and the police might be able to check some database to see which cameras saw it going by. Then they can track where it went and perhaps find the thief. And they would already have the thief's picture, taken by the cameras as he passed.
The downside? Go to the library and see if they still have a copy of "1984." Read it and you'll understand.
As a rule of thumb, if something is technically possible, sooner or later it will be done, especially if there's money to be made.
The people who sell these camera systems must be expected to keep looking for new applications and buyers to use them. That's enough reason for Oregon to keep an eye on the industry and make sure that routine 24-hour surveillance of public places by government cameras is never allowed by law. (hh)