Sunday, January 2, 2005
Big Brother's Watchful Eye Welcomed in Downtown Dallas
Surveillence cameras have been installed in downtown Dallas's entertainment district, Deep Ellum, to help merchants and law enforcement officials alike fight crime. Business owners and police officers can monitor events as they unfold by watching live video feeds on computer screens or laptop computers, or they can watch taped versions to review past activity to later identify suspects. According to the Deep Ellum Association, merchants, patrons, and law enforcement officials have welcomed the watchful eye. "We want to show people this is a good place to come to enjoy yourself," Don Cass of the Deep Ellum Association said. More... [Mark Godsey]
https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2005/01/big_brothers_wa.html
Grits for Breakfast had an item on that Thursday, BTW, highlighting the problems with sharing police surveillance data with private businesses:
http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/2004/12/dallas-cops-share-surveillance-tapes.html
The backstory here is that in 2003 Texas made all info about surveillance cameras secret, so nobody can know what they're doing with the video and other information they gather. Meanwhile, the state DMV wants to develop biometric facial recognition databases on drivers, hoping to ID faces from video.
Happy New Year.
Posted by: Scott | Jan 2, 2005 6:11:08 AM