Comment on Drug Enforcement Administration agent used Illinois cop’s Flock license plate reader password for immigration enforcement searches

FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

• Hawke@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  Username does not check out.

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  • meco03211@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    ^for me, not for thee^ is missing from the name.

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• mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  It does make sense. Police are not perfect saint-like beings, and the government is not composed of perfect beings either. I’m not sure what kind of person you are, but I’m sure there are some things you enjoy and partake in which some other social group really despises. If you’re religious, it may be militant atheists who despise you going to church. If you’re not religious, it may be militant theists who despise you not going to church. The point is, there’s probably some social cultures out there that hate you for the things that you love. Those people may not be in charge right now, but they might be one day. Those people can end up in police departments, as developers for these camera companies, as administrators for the database that collects information on where you drive and when. Those people, being imperfect as they are, may not always resist the temptation to use this system in a way to track down and identify people like you for doing whatever it is that you love and they hate. Now you end up on a list for that.

  There’s no denying that sophisticated surveillance technology does make it easier to catch criminals and does legitimately protect from the threats those criminals pose. But surveillance technology, by it’s very nature, cannot surveil only the criminals - it has to surveil everyone to find the criminals. And the notion of what is criminal may change. If your favorite hobby becomes criminalized, or if the government criminalizes your identity itself, these beautifully effective tools are suddenly turned against you.

  There is a happy medium to be found between giving your society tools to enforce the will of constituents, vs. giving your society tools that be too easily abused. Given that this tool is already being abused, it probably isn’t worth the benefits.

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    But if they did criminalise my favourite hobby, and they had evidence that I’m continuing to do that hobby in plain sight, they see me doing it every day……I’d expect them to come get me. That makes sense. It makes no sense to have that technology there to be used to find some crimes but not others.

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    • mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      I see what you’re saying. You’re not talking about “making sense” in an ethical or social well-being sense, you mean it’s literally confusing why the technology wouldn’t be used for all kinds of crimes, given that it already exists - irrespective of whether the technology should be used. Is that right? Like, sure it’s dystopian and creepy, but why wouldn’t the creepy dystopia use the tech for all cases then rather than just some? That’s a good question. I think because there is legitimately some understanding of the dangers of using these powerful tools willy-nilly. While people aren’t perfect angels, they also aren’t perfect devils either. Another factor is that there is some pressure to appear not to be overly heavy-handed with these tools - as we see in those chats, they knew it made them look bad for this to get out.

      And the final most pessimistic factor is that this company almost certainly chargers per seat, so giving direct usernames and logins to every officer or even every department is probably absurdly expensive. Companies will often try to limit their license seats to as few people as possible and then just funnel as much different people’s work through that one person’s license as they can.

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      • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        But you’re saying, like, sure it’s dystopian and creepy and wrong, but why wouldn’t the creepy dystopia use the tech for all cases then rather than just some?

        I’m also saying it’s not really any more creepy or dystopian than say … speed cameras. They’re there to catch people that break the law. If these cameras are already used to catch people breaking some laws, the logic of “well they should only be allowed to catch people who break these specific laws, but not these other laws” doesn’t make any sense.

        If you know the license plate of a car of a wanted murderer, and the FLOCK camera system recognises that number plate, why on earth would anyone be against the FLOCK camera system arbitrarily not being allowed to be used to catch that murderer?

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• NocturnalMorning@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  Because fuck ICE, thats why…

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Nah. People should not be in a country illegally. They want to migrate? Do it legally like the rest of the law abiding citizens.

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    • lohky@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      They’re arresting legal citizens too, chud.

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      • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        For being illegal immigrants? No they’re not lol.

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• FauxLiving@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  Why?! Why is immigration enforcement being stifled so much? Imagine if there was a police database that could help find murderers

  It could be because immigrants are not as bad as murderers.

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    That’s completely irrelevant. If you can identify someone as being in the country illegally it makes no sense to not be allowed to act on it.

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    • FauxLiving@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      This isn’t a good argument.

      If law enforcement had access to all of your social media, e-mails and live video feeds from inside your house then they would be able to catch criminals more effectively.

      We have laws specifically limiting police powers because we recognize that there are more things to consider than simply maximizing arrests.

      Protection against unreasonable search is written into the constitution, after all

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      • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        If law enforcement had access to all of your social media, e-mails and live video feeds from inside your house then they would be able to catch criminals more effectively.

        This isn’t the same because law enforcement don’t have access to all of your social media already. This is more like if they did but were only allowed to arrest you for you posting a video of you murdering someone, but not for you posting a video of you raping someone.

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• thedruid@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  I’m not responding to you’re entire verbal vomit. am going to say this.

  What youve written at the end is not what’s happening.

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    What youve written at the end is not what’s happening.

    It is though.

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• dhork@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  Because immigration enforcement is a civil violation, not a criminal one. Imagine if the government said that license plate readers could be used to enforce copyright violations, or defamation. Say a bad word about the President and they will use the system to find your car and wait for you to send you to Alligator Auschwitz without a trial.

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Entering the country illegally is a crime under federal law, not civil. Remaining in the country after your legal immigration status is up is a civil issue, but deportation is a lawful response.

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    • thedruid@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      Do you think a person should be seperated from thier families, put into prison, subjected to violence, and sent to a country they’ve never been to for a misdemeanor?

      Because thats a criminal misdemeanor, not civil like immigration. But you dont care do you? You got yours…

      Ghoul

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      • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Do you think a person should be seperated from thier families

        This argument is such a stupid one that is purely made to pull at people’s heart strings. If someone commits murder should they not be sent to jail because doing so would “separate them from their family”?

        People in the country illegally should be removed from the country. Full stop. They’re just deported back to their country of citizenship, unless they’re one of the gang members in which case they are going to prison.

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• jaybone@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  A bit of missing context - the officer with the access to the FLOCK system shared his account details with many other officers including the DEA agent because he thought that’s just what was done since he was the only one with an account.

  LOLLLLLLLL

  And I suppose any arrests or convictions based on that were not legal or overturned, right??

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Well you would assume that some people might be able to appeal based on this.

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• grindemup@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  Despite all the downvotes, I think it’s a reasonable enough question. It happens to have a very reasonable answer though.

  First of all, your concern is largely addressed, since immigration control can still access law enforcement databases if they have a warrant.

  As for why this law exists at all, well it’s actually to the benefit of law enforcement: the idea is that immigrant communities are more likely to cooperate with law enforcement if they aren’t scared that they will be the target of immigration control. This is all the more practical now, when ICE has degraded into a largely lawless and authoritarian organization, since you can imagine most immigrants wouldn’t want to say a word to any police officer unless they at least have the protections of the 2017 TRUST act in place.

  Now, what I’m a bit confused about is why you are so up-in-arms about the existence of this law instead of the violation of this law. Surely if you are so law-abiding as you make out to be in your comments, you should be shouting for legal action against the police officers involved in breaking the law.

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  • FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    when ICE has degraded into a largely lawless and authoritarian organization

    I think you’re mistaking actually enforcing the law as being “lawless and authoritarian”.

    Now, what I’m a bit confused about is why you are so up-in-arms about the existence of this law instead of the violation of this law.

    I’m not so “up in arms” about anything, just questioning why the authorities are handicapped on what they can use one of their systems for. Sure, the violation of the law is bad - but the law itself seems ridiculous. The only people it benefits are literally criminals.

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