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Comment by QAPereo | Hacker News Reader

It doesn't sound like that much of the mystery at the end of the day, as the article concludes that it's probably a USAF/JSOC/CIA training mission.

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As they're flying out of Boeing Field, I'd tend to agree. Plenty of aircraft go through rounds of testing and qualification there.

The following, though, does remain the law of the land:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Surveillance of publicly visible areas is not the same as search and seizure of your person, house, papers, or effects.

That depends heavily on what tools are being used for the surveillance.

While this might feel counterintuitive, it's supported by Supreme Court precedent.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States

I think the future of this doctrine is unclear.

The "bright line" here is "at the entrance to the home". But there is no indication in the article that the plane in question is seeing things inside people's homes, or imaging heat given off from inside the home (which was the issue in the Supreme Court case). It's just (the article speculates) observing activites outside people's homes, in public spaces. So I don't think the precedent you cite is relevant.

Point being, if the aircraft is looking at private residences using sensors that reveal things that couldn't ordinarily be perceived by humans, its activities may be legally iffy.

But that's what parallel construction is for, I guess...

One cop on a street corner observing the public is one thing.

A group of people with a warrant gathering detailed routines of a suspect is one thing.

An apparatus that can observe the detailed activities and whereabouts (location AND behavior) of all people in a metro area is a completely different thing, and one our courts and Constitution have not yet handled.

What's the difference other than technology makes it more efficient. I'm sure the courts will weigh in eventually but this seems like a legislative issue.

Efficiency is a problem in it's own right. It drives down cost. Which means that surveillance will be used more often and for less important reasons. It's not uncommon for people to need to skirt the law from time to time. This is particularly true of people in the lower classes of society. Is it fair to ding a retail worker whose car registration just expired but needs a few days to get it all straightened out? That's something modern surveillance could easily handle nearly perfectly.

We could also just write laws that allow grace periods to cover problems like that. It is already common legislative practice to do that in many cases...

My original point was I find the "It's too efficient" argument to be a very weak attack angle on the use of technology in surveillance.

> one our courts and Constitution have not yet handled.

Exactly. It's one thing to say our laws and Constitution should place strict limitations on this kind of surveillance. I agree with that.

But it's another thing to say they already do, when they don't.

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