UK Home Sec wants Minority Report-style policing – using your slurped data UK Home Secretary Theresa May has called on police forces to use predictive analytics in crime prevention as a way of mining the "vast quantities of data" the public now generates. Speaking at the Police ICT Suppliers Summit, she said: "Forces have not yet begun to explore the crime prevention opportunities that data offers …
> I would be more concerned with them being able to deal with data that is right in front of them
Like when a member of the public sees a vehicle for sale that's so obviously a ringer that it goes ding-dong ? In that case a Land Rover described as one thing, but every detail on it said later model - and it's condition explained by having been an estate vehicle and cared for lovingly. No flippin way was that the vehicle described - it would have cost so much in parts to alter the appearance in all those little details that the seller would be shouting about it and wanting a lot more.
So what does plod do when handed this "arrest on a plate" ?
My local county - "nowt to do with us"
County where the vehicle supposedly resides - "we'll add it to the intelligence file"
All it needs is for a plod to pop in when in the area and take a flippin look ! OK, it might have to be someone with a clue what a Land Rover looks like, but it shouldn't be hard to spot as a ringer. The seller gets nicked for having a stolen vehicle, and the original owner gets their pride and joy back - what's not to like ?
You do have to wonder why we bother trying to do the right thing.
But why?
If we analyse all the data to ensure that any sociopaths are isolated and treated early on she will be the LAST ONE. HER NEXT INCARNATION will be in Broadmoor instead of being elected. Ditto for Camoron.
I say bring it on. She will be one of the first ones to be flagged as a pre-crime suspect.
"the proper restrictions to ensure privacy and that access and use of data is lawful and appropriate,"
but what makes 'lawful' and 'appropriate' one and the same? Much can be done legally that does not equal appropriate. Even more so if she got her way
Something is lawful if the laws they pass say it is. If it isn't (e.g. a new police database) then it is soon made lawful.
Appropiate, well, that can take ages to work out and go through the courts and then if it isn't then the law can be reworded again...
Subject: Riot. Dear Sir/Madam, I am writing to inform you of a riot that has broken out on the premises of 123 Cavendon Road... no, that's too formal.
[deletes text, starts again]
Riot - exclamation mark - riot - exclamation mark - help me - exclamation mark. 123 Cavendon Road. Looking forward to hearing from you. Yours truly, Maurice Moss.
We wrote the system that caught all those MPs buying shares in public companies under several different spellings of their name.
We tried to sell it to the police force of a certain UK capital city. They proudly showed us their home made name system, it could match Sean/Shaun and Alisdair/Alistair/Ali/Al - so presumably having solved the problem of those Irish terrorist spelling their names wrong they can now find this "Alistair Queda" bloke
It may be a good thing for the people of the UK, that the coppers and their hirelings haven't solved the 43 network problem. I don't think it will be a good day for you folks when they do.
btw, the individual pictured at the top of the article, is it wrong that the first word that popped into my head was "harridan"?
"is it wrong that the first word that popped into my head was "harridan"?"
No. Personally, when I see or hear TMs name, I picture Zelda from Terrahawks in my head!
...to make it illegal for politicians (or anyone else in a potential policy making position) to make proposals regarding Security unless they can first demonstrate a clear understanding of the deep interdependence between Privacy and Security.
I'll leave the finer details as an exercise for the class...
Right, so repeal the first amendment - then set up a government body to license people to speak and write on given ranges of topics. You'd need to pass a mandatory public examination before you're licensed to comment on a blog.
Yeah, I can see that being really popular in some quarters. Not so sure about others.
"identify those most at risk of crime, locations most likely to see crimes committed, patterns of suspicious activity that may merit investigation and to target their resources most effectively against the greatest threats."
So expect the police to be driving right past your mugging to quickly get to the perceived threat of school children dropping litter outside a councillors home after the home-time bell is sounded.
I thought the point of MR was that you were prosecuted and punished for the crimes that you hadn't comitted yet. In fairness to the Home Secretary (yeah, I'm posting this just because I've never had a chance to write those words in that order before) I think she is still minded to wait until you've committed it. (If not, then we'll have to rely on the judges insisting on the correct chronological sequence.)
I think it's more a long the lines of "It is highly probable that you will offend in the future. Thus, for your safety, please wear these tags so that we can monitor you. What? Pay no attention to that CCTV camera outside your home and that tracker in your car"
" I think she is still minded to wait until you've committed it. "
There has been a trend for Home Secretaries to become frustrated when the courts won't convict someone. So they devise non-criminal offences - which then have a severe criminal penalty if you commit them. Eg ASBOs.
The recent case of the man found not guilty of a sexual offence but who has to report to the police 24 hours before engaging in sex - seems to be a bizarre case of the thin end of the wedge.
The ECRB presumably penalises people on the basis of hearsay, "soft intelligence", and failed attempts to prosecute or convict them.
We seem to be sleepwalking into a totalitarian state where anyone can be branded as guilty - solely based on what they might be capable of doing. A bit like US President Jimmy Carter saying someone was guilty of adultery even if they only had a thought about it. Japan in the 1920s had a criminal offence of thought-crime.
You're not sleep-walking into a totalitarian state, you are already firmly there. The case of someone being found not guilty and yet having to report to the police is prima facie evidence. The totalitarianism is currently set at "mild" but, make no mistake, the UK is already there. Look forward to a visit from the police for a familial DNA match on the dogshit database at some point.
The no-fly list in the US did not require a criminal act in order to prevent boarding of a plane. If you made a similar case for all public transportation, you could severely restrict a person's movement in a country like the UK, without any commission of an actual crime. The government has to choose which they want: secret state-enemy lists, or access to analytics on all citizens private data. Having both is an Egypt-style dictatorship waiting to happen.
> you could severely restrict a person's movement in a country like the UK, without any commission of an actual crime.
We had internal border checks on UK citizens travelling to one part of the UK a few years ago.
And 30 years ago we had people stopped at police checkpoints in England because they might be going to a strike.
"Except that planning a crime or having the ability to commit a crime is in some cases now a crime."
It seems when an investigation is running out of steam then someone's name in an address book can can be spun into an arrest for "conspiracy". That then enables a fishing expedition to search computers etc.
"Theresa May has called on police forces to use predictive analytics in crime"
As they say when selling financial products: previous behaviour is no indication of future behaviour". It's also not very good at identifying new criminals.
But, of course:
"that too much money is still spent on expensive, fragmented and outdated systems"
So how we're going to get all that lovely information (which may or may not be useful) is anyones guess.
And of course " She noted how there is currently no single list of hair colours for identifying suspects or convicts and describing victims, agreed across all forces, makes automated comparison of records impossible"
Which means that how we build a common data set for doing that wonderful predictive checking is, again, anyones guess.
But, never fear, because when they solve all these issues " "the proper restrictions to ensure privacy and that access and use of data is lawful and appropriate.".
Pull the other one
... this is a bad idea
We've got to trust that data gathered is gathered for -moral- purposes (I'm not going to bother using the term "legal" here).
We've got to trust that the data, once gathered, is stored securely, guarded against theft, and not used for purposes other than for which it was obtained.
We've then also got to give the job of gathering and analysing this torrent of data to a police force and a government that can't seem to keep current records consistent or run any kind of IT project on time and within budget. Didn't the Met recently fluff a project to get a new walkie-talkie system?
They lack the finance to pull this off, they lack the ability to pull this off, they lack the time, resource and morality to pull it off as well.
"One force lists the colour maroon which other forces don’t recognise, while others disagree on whether a hair colour is brown-auburn or simply auburn," she said.
I think that Dulux, or Crown or B&Q could help them out with that. (He had Autumn Glade hair with a touch of Moonmist at the sides.)
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
