New Bill Would Force NYPD to Disclose Its Surveillance Tech Playbook

[steven36]

Legislation introduced today by New York City council members Dan Garodnick and Vanessa Gibson would finally compel the NYPD — one of the most technology-laden police forces in the country — to make public its rulebook for deploying its controversial surveillance arsenal.

 

 

The bill, named the Public Oversight of Surveillance Technology (POST) act, would require the NYPD to detail how, when, and with what authority it uses technologies like Stingray devices, which can monitor and interfere with the cellular communications of an entire crowd at once. Specifically, the department would have to publicize the “rules, processes and guidelines issued by the department regulating access to or use of such surveillance technology as well as any prohibitions or restrictions on use, including whether the department obtains a court authorization for each use of a surveillance technology, and what specific type of court authorization is sought.”

 

The NYPD would also have to say how it protects the gathered surveillance data itself (for example, X-ray imagery, or individuals captured in a facial recognition scan), and whether or not this data is shared with other governmental organizations. A period of public comment would follow these disclosures.

In a press release, the New York Civil Liberties Union, which has been instrumental in fighting to reveal the mere fact that the NYPD possesses devices like the Stingray, hailed the bill:

Public awareness of how the NYPD conducts intrusive surveillance, especially the impacts on vulnerable New Yorkers, is critical to democracy. For too long the NYPD has been using technology that spies on cellphones, sees through buildings and follows your car under a shroud of secrecy, and the bill is a significant step out of the dark ages.

It’s unclear whether the bill would apply to products that have both powerful surveillance and non-surveillance functionality, a la Palantir, but the legislation’s definition of “surveillance technology” is sufficiently broad:

The term “surveillance technology” means equipment, software, or system capable of, or used or designed for, collecting, retaining, processing, or sharing audio, video, location, thermal, biometric, or similar information, that is operated by or at the direction of the department.

Though the bill might do little to curb the use of such technologies, it would at least give those on the sidewalk a better idea of how and when they’re being watched, if not why.

The NYPD did not immediately return a request for comment.

By Sam Biddle

https://theintercept.com/2017/03/01/new-bill-would-force-nypd-to-disclose-its-surveillance-tech-playbook/

 

[straycat19]

What a joke.  There are a thousand ways to get around that bill. The simplest is to no longer use those devices within the NYPD, per se.  Instead you outsource surveillance to a private company who does not have to tell anyone what devices it uses or how, except during prosecution in a court of law.  Or the State Police, who are not bound by such a stupid law, establish a surveillance unit that is loaned to the NYPD for cases.  Or even civilian volunteers who have access to those devices 'share' information they 'inadvertently' collected.  And even if someone took them to court over any of these it could be tied up for many, many years by which time the devices they are trying to get information on would be obsolete.  

[steven36]

They should make the cops ware cams too many places already are . I live so far away from a city  I dont have too worry about no CC TV in my area no time  soon.

 

Look up a search on  body cams for officers everyday more cities are making police ware them and surveillance is backfiring on them because there being watched too.

[Cypher3927]

13 hours ago, straycat19 said:

What a joke.  There are a thousand ways to get around that bill. The simplest is to no longer use those devices within the NYPD, per se.  Instead you outsource surveillance to a private company who does not have to tell anyone what devices it uses or how, except during prosecution in a court of law.  Or the State Police, who are not bound by such a stupid law, establish a surveillance unit that is loaned to the NYPD for cases.  Or even civilian volunteers who have access to those devices 'share' information they 'inadvertently' collected.  And even if someone took them to court over any of these it could be tied up for many, many years by which time the devices they are trying to get information on would be obsolete.  

Scumbags will always find a way to crawl up the public's asshole. It's all done for our security said the mindless automatons and those seeking to control us. The world we live in is utterly sickening.

 

 

[steven36]

NY City Council Measure Would Require Transparency for NYPD Electronic Surveillance

Two members of the New York City Council introduced a bill on Wednesday, March 1 to enact long overdue transparency rules for the NYPD’s procurement and deployment of electronic surveillance technology. It is the latest in a series of similar proposals around the country modeled on a Silicon Valley law adopted in 2016, which was crafted to impose municipal checks  and balances to constrain on executive power and address the metastasis of surveillance.

 

 

The Public Oversight of Surveillance Technology (POST) Act, introduced by councilmembers Dan Garodnick and Vanessa Gibson, would require important disclosures by the NYPD before it buys electronic surveillance gear. It would also require an opportunity for public comment on its proposed use policies. 

 

 

In particular, the POST Act would require the NYPD to publish a use policy for each electronic surveillance platform that it uses, or that it seeks to use in the future. The policy must explain the applicable supervisory guidelines and potential requirements for court authorization, as well as afeguards or security measures designed to protect…from unauthorized access" of the sort that has plagued federal surveillance efforts. Each platform’s use policy must also include parameters for data retention, access, use, and dissemination, as well as reports or tests about the technology’s potential impact on health and safety.

 

Informed by the history of executive circumvention of legal limits on surveillance authorities, the POST Act also provides for ongoing auditing by the NYPD's inspector general. That office was created three years ago when the Council—responding to mounting concerns about police accountability—overrode a veto by then Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who sought to prevent the Inspector General’s office from being established in the first place.

 

Because of separation of powers principles embedded in the New York State constitution, NYC's POST act is less demanding than the Silicon Valley law on which it was based. Specifically, the NYC proposal lacks a legislative veto over proposed surveillance platforms. The transparency rules proposed in NYC would, however, represent a big step forward from the current baseline.

 

 

Transparency, relative to the prevailing practice of secret procurement and unaccountable use, could be effectively transformative. Noting a history of secrecy precluding effective oversight by Councilmembers, Faiza Patel & Michael Price

 

By  Shahid Buttar @ EFF.org

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/03/ny-city-council-measure-would-require-transparency-nypd-electronic-surveillance