http://computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=printArticleBasic&articleId=9055126
Opinion: I want to live in a surveillance society
Mike Elgan
January 03, 2008 (Computerworld) I
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There are many situations where I’d like to see surveillance legalized, normalized or even required, including:
* Interaction with police: When we get pulled over, it should be perfectly legal to openly videotape the entire conversation, as well as when we’re questioned or interrogated. They’ve got a dash cam or interrogation room camera pointed at us. We should have one pointed at them, too. (The knowledge that such cameras are allowed might prevent abuse like this.)
* Any interaction between caregiver and child: When babies and children or seniors or others who for whatever reason aren’t able to defend themselves are potential targets for abuse, it should be legal for their parents or other relatives to secretly tape encounters with caregivers and use those recordings as evidence in court.
* Anytime politicians meet with lobbyists: Why not use required surveillance to expose or prevent backdoor wheeling and dealing? When our representatives meet with special interest groups, corporate executives or other people out to buy influence, it’s not something that’s personal or private for the elected politician. There should be special lobbyist meeting rooms with cameras running 24/7. If congressmen and others meet with lobbyists outside the rooms, they go to jail for corruption. This is the people’s business, and we have the right to know all about those conversations.
* Court: It should be our right to record any public hearing or courtroom proceeding. If the public is invited, then banning video cameras and voice recorders is only to reduce the accountability of the judge (rather than, say, to protect the privacy of the accused). Why should judges be granted this protection?
* Your own phone calls: It’s legal to secretly record your own phone calls in 38 states (plus the District of Columbia). But it’s illegal in the other 12 states: California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington. You can record calls only if you get the consent of the other person on the phone. But I think all rights and protections involving your home (such as the right to keep security cameras and other cameras running without announcing the fact to visitors) apply to your home phone as well — and your cell phone, too, for that matter.
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Seems only fair. How can we “prove” their misconduct? And, they always misbehave.
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