Microsoft won’t sell police its facial-recognition technology
washingtonpost.com
washingtonpost.com
In this context, why is ethical for Microsoft to build the US military a "war planning and operations" cloud as part of the JEDI contract?
In what reality is selling facial-recognition technology to police somehow less ethical than making the US military, in their own terms, "more lethal"?
If Microsoft rejects the police for being human rights abusers, they should do the same for the US military, which has regularly violated human rights around the world.
One can easily argue that many of the US’s current problems have to do with getting that blend incorrect but it doesn’t obviate the idea that done tech should go to one but not the other.
Killing people is really no different anywhere in the world. They're ok with their technology being used to kill, just so long as it's only people in certain place in the world and done by a certain group. What difference is it to me if I'm shot by a cop or a soldier? Either way I'm being shot by someone, likely far more well armed and armoured than myself, at the behest of the government. Who cares whether their uniform is blue or green?
They demand different kinds of violence.
The issue is that modern policing and invasion are not that black and white.
Legally speaking it most certainly is, otherwise cops, soldiers, or criminals killing would be treated the same way. Morally... perhaps it's a grey area but one thing I'm sure you agree with is that there is a massive difference between a military conflict between armed parties, and a conflict between police and anything from unarmed bystanders to criminals. There's a common sense principle of proportionality that hasn't been observed in too long.
Jack the Ripper wasn't a surgeon because "cutting is really no different anywhere in the world".
I guess that depends doesn't it. A gunfight between armed gangsters and cops in the middle of an urban area isn't all that different than a small american patrol in an urban area in say Iraq, Libya or Syria getting into a gun fight with a group of insurgents. In both cases there will be innocent bystanders likely caught in the middle. As far as both a logical and moral perspective goes, American soldiers have far less right to be killing people in those countries than a police officer defending against armed criminals in their own jurisdiction.
All these arguments on it being 'right' are based on the assumption that America's armies currently being used to invade other nations is 'right'. If America's armies weren't being used to oppress and and control other nations, I'd maybe agree with you more.
This is exactly how I'd frame any situation to defend any argument or position no matter how inappropriate it is.
Dressing up police like soldiers and letting them rip on harmless and unarmed people is most definitely not the same as soldiers in a declared conflict making collateral damage while fighting a genuinely dangerous army armed to the teeth. Soldiers dress like soldiers because they have to go fight other soldiers and face machine gun or sniper fire, mortars, IEDs, grenades, tanks, etc. Police dresses up like soldiers to fight some people with a bandanna and a passive aggressive sign. Are you telling me that's the same?
Unless a country declares war on its citizens the police should not be allowed under any circumstances to treat them as an enemy combatant. And it doesn't even matter really, the fact that the US Army is more that willing to commit war crimes should have no impact on what the Police does to its citizens.
This is what happens when common sense stops being common, when people no longer understand "appropriate force" and "proportionality".
US citizens deserve the same response in daily life from a police under the "serve and protect" banner that an enemy combatant gets from the opposing military during an active conflict? You can't treat every citizen as if they are the worst possible one. If you got this "you could be the worst ever" treatment in any other situation you would certainly not find acceptable to reference the fact that the army also does it while in a war.
If you can’t trust your police with it, then there is something fundamentally wrong with your society.
At least if it's in the hands of corporations there's still a chance that the only entity more powerful (the government) will do something about it (through regulation).
There is something fundamentally wrong with American society, though. No arguments there.
This announcement coincides with protests against police brutality, at which many police have behaved brutally. That was sparked by an outright homicide by a police officer, captured on video, of a man who was subdued and presented no threat -- while other police officers watched, and many others have subsequently attempted to justify.
The "something fundamentally wrong" is very complex and subject to genuine debate, but it's not subject to debate that whatever it is, people don't trust the police.
I dont agree. Racism is a problem but I think corruption is the core. The police are often taught that they are above the law, starting with quotas - which encourage ticketing people for minor, subjective, or fictitious infractions. Moving up to things like parallel construction (lying in court), civil forfeiture (stealing from people), coercing confessions, and more. Then sprinkle in speeding when on duty when there is no reason, or illegally parking at McDonalds to run in for a burger. From small to significant infractions they give themselves and each other a pass, or are taught or encouraged to do wrong. In an environment like that you drop in a couple racists and well...
There are studies on workplace safety. If you want to prevent fatal accidents you start by creating a culture of safety from the bottom. You clean up work spaces. You take care of trip hazards. You measure the number of bandages used each month and take measures to prevent those accidents. Over time this results in fewer fatalities even on large construction projects.
I think the same applies to corruption.
This is a legislative and judicial issue as well. Politicians, a fair number of whom are former judges, pass terrible legislation that is then prosecuted by DA's with little to no regard for justice (only conviction rates matter, right?), while cases are judged by former DA's who've managed to move up the chain a little. The management layer is a circle of incestuous self aggrandizing bullshit, and while cops are the boots stepping on the people, someone else to managing where, and how most of that stepping happens.
There's a gif that humorously demonstrates this mentality [1] and shows a police officer instinctively pepper spraying the air around him in response to falling down, even though there's no one around him.
Personally, I blame the laws & culture that encourage excessive civilian gun ownership. The common excuse for preemptive police brutality is the fear that a civilian could be reaching for a gun which puts the officer's life in danger. Without guns, police have no excuse to strike preemptively and it'd be much easier to gain political support for de-arming the police.
Isn't "defund the police" 99% "that's a nice slogan", not actually "we'll be good without any form of law enforcement"? From what I understand it's a play to break unions: you defund and dismantle the police department and then you can create a new department, can start fresh with new people, new tactics etc pp. Might work, might not, but it's certainly not "eliminate policing".
you can google for more details.
No.
> not actually "we'll be good without any form of law enforcement"?
Not that, either.
“Defund the police” is about shifting substantial amounts of funding from police to supportive/responsive social service instead of law enforcement.
> From what I understand it's a play to break unions:
That's probably true of some supporters of the related-but-distinct abolish/dismantle effort, but even there it's not the main focus.
> you defund and dismantle the police department and then you can create a new department, can start fresh with new people, new tactics etc pp.
Dismantle/abolish does allow that, but most of the push for it is not for abolish-and-directly-replace, but for rethinking public safety and community services more generally and redesigning how law enforcement fits into it. While any replacement includes law enforcement personnel employed somewhere, they may not include a single large centralized paramilitary organization like the dominant model for city police / county sheriffs offices, and might (for instance) involve domain-specific law enforcement officers embedded in a variety of different public agencies.
It can, and for many people does, mean abolishing (not merely replacing) police departments as institutions, but, yes, it does not mean abolishing the law enforcement function of government.
I want to see suggestions, for any major city, how much of their budget we should cut (as percentage and gross) as well as where this funding should go as a percentage of how much funding already goes to that place.
Apologies if this is readily available, I haven’t seen it yet.
> The end goal of these reforms is not to create better, friendlier, or more community-oriented police or prisons. Instead, we hope to build toward a society without police or prisons, where communities are equipped to provide for their safety and wellbeing.
When somebody breaks into my home, I don't need a counselor; I need some sort of investigator or detective who can track that man down and make sure he doesn't do it again. Maybe that guy needs a counselor instead of a prison sentence, I'm [skeptical of but] amenable to that idea, but who does the grunt work of figuring how who did it and where he's at? Who brings him to trial, where his guilt or innocence can be assessed? I can't find any answers for this on that site, so it's hard for me to take seriously.
This document also mentions permanently closing all jails and freeing everybody from involuntary detention, etc. When a man refuses to stop beating his wife, where should he be put? I don't see any answers for this. Is the idea really to create a utopia where people no longer do shitty things to other people? Because if so, that's a pipe dream, not a serious proposal.
Within the movement, there are different groups with different policy proposals (which, even in the “defund” camp, are not limited to just moving money around), which inherently must vary in detail for specific police departments.
But mostly the point right now is to get the people who legislate at the local level to agree that the broad principal is worthy of detailed discussion. And most advocates anywhere on the defund/dismantle spectrum will tell you that they are calling for a broad rethinking around a particular outline involving a variety of community and government groups, not selling a detailed package of ready-to-implement policies.
The Democratic Party sponsored and suggested legislation throws even more money to police forces and does nothing to suggest curtailing the undue influence public employee unions have with the cities and localities they are supposed to serve. If anything the large unions have already walked back any talk that collective bargaining agreements are shielding the police and they have exerted their pressure on politicians at all levels. The reason being is because these public employee unions know if police unions fall then teachers will be next and the party cannot allow that.
So expect nothing more than a few hundred million dollars splashed around and virtue signaling bills offered up, this is a bill which is not expected to pass but if it does in the end does nothing to actually fix the problem.
To fix the police requires locking up their guns to where gaining access to them is under very set rules that cannot be watered down with exceptions. It requires requiring at all times, subject to termination, the full use of cameras any time they work either as police or contracted work in uniform; like directing traffic or protection for private individuals. It requires an outside board govern disciplinary proceedings and not leaving it up to the police force to prosecute their own when they do wrong. It requires keeping records for the lifetime of every officer that follows them where they go.
There is a lot that can be done but just watching the news shows how much is being done to insure not much actually changes but that politicians get their face time needs satisfied.
If it only means that other politically connected groups that are territorial about funding get it instead of police departments, then...good? I mean, part of the accountability problem with law enforcement is the institutional power that comes from the amount that is centralized in the monolithic local law enforcement agencies.
(And “hundreds of millions” is probably right or in some cases low for a single large local department; e.g., LA's mayor who opposes the “defund” movement has backed a $150 million shift along the same lines for the LAPD, a large number of NY City Council members and candidates are calling for $1 billion to be redistributed from NYPDs annual budget.)
> The Democratic Party sponsored and suggested legislation throws even more money to police forces
If the defund (and even more clearly the dismantle/abolish) movement is successful, the local agencies with law enforcement functions applying for and receiving that federal funding may not (in the latter case will not) be the centralized paramilitary police forces that are targeted by defund/dismantle/abolish.
None of these movements are opposed to law enforcement functions, or to funding them.
The moment Seattle organizes an "autonomous zone", they appoint a violent warlord with a Kalashnikov and proceed to shake down local businesses for funding. If you don't need the police, why the warlord? If you don't need capitalism, why the shakedowns and requests for, I quote, "soy products"?
https://www.reddit.com/r/CapHillAutonomousZone/comments/h0lo...
To most people “abolish” means “it shall exist no longer” rather than “we’ll replace current police departments with reformed police departments along with possibly some budgetary changes”
It’s a bit of sloganeering as currently constructed, though admittedly the police need reforming and retraining especially deescallation with regard to mentally imbalanced, people as well as people who’re high and such.
"Defund" is a good example of a term which has a precise, nuanced, technical definition to its main users but which shouldn't be used in common speech because it is so easily and terribly misunderstood. For another example, think about the word "intercourse". It can just mean "communication"... but what is the first idea that comes to most people's mind when people come across that word?
I disagree. Why should anyone at all be trusted with facial recognition technology? What if facial recognition technology is a fundamental enabler of dictatorship?
It's actually kind of terrible at that, because it's not perfectly accurate. Even if they could make it 99% accurate, the country has 300+ million people in it and for every person you told it to match, it'd give you three million false positives.
What it's used for is mass surveillance. You capture a face and there are millions of possible matches, but hey, one of the matches just bought something with a credit card 50 meters from there. Or they're carrying a cell phone billed to a person whose DMV photo matches that face. Then they put the cell phone down and travel on a vector from there past twelve more cameras.
You get everyone's location history and meatspace social graph in a database. That's way more useful to an oppressive regime than any kind of legitimate use, because you can get the same information from a suspect under investigation by conducting surveillance of only them, e.g. put a GPS on their car.
Retroactive surveillance can be used by future regimes to observe past behavior. Even if your existing government is trustworthy, there is an election every four years and turnkey fascism is inherently dangerous.
Meanwhile retroactivity not all that useful for legitimate purposes because criminals who are actively committing new crimes can be caught by non-retroactive surveillance specifically of them, whereas there is a much weaker state interest in interest in catching criminals who have already reformed and stopped committing new crimes.
Yeah under those assumptions it would be true that sun rises in the west.
If a corporation uses facial recognition to count how many times I walked into a 7-11, I care much less about that than I do about the authorities building a database and watching every step people take in public. Yes maybe it's a little tinfoil hat to say, but the police/district attorneys are people and some of them are good, some bad. Why give them a tool that can be abused and misused against you?
It is sort of a bleach and ammonia thing. One or the other is more or less fine with some potential for both legitimate use and abuse but together are a horribly toxic combination which is guaranteed to hurt and kill innocent people.
Not necessarily saying Microsoft will do that, but they could do it if they're committed to this.
AI and facial recognition require real investigative skill because they are still high risk technologies compared to current policing tactics. As it stands, cops mostly arrest brown and black low income people on capricious charges because the revenue is predictable and the suspects rarely have access to meaningful council that wont immediately direct them to plea-bargain. the revenue from this policing is nontrivial in the city budget, and it puts warm bodies in profitable corporate jails that many deficit-run cities are fully dependent upon to service their debt.
AI and Facial recognition introduce the very real potential to arrest someone who not only isnt your suspect, but is powerful enough to fight back and make you look very bad. You cross over from comfy cop to officer who will need to be able to prove a crime based on evidence. for a lot of law enforcement that have become versed in their union bylaws, buying a product that can get them fired if they arent sharp gumshoes to solve real crime isnt an appealing idea anyway. And since we hire most cops from our boots-on-ground military troops, the argument could be made that most arent the sharpest sherlocks.
Another problem is police overloading. cops are already social workers, dog catchers, school truancy enforcers, and crisis management mental health workers. Theres not much a cop in the US does not do if you call them. the idea of now making them a cloud-based AI guru at some level is likely going to be met with some resistance. What does the FR do? and what additional duties will cops have to absorb once its online? Is every face at a busy festival going to have cops chasing lookalikes? how do you get help if facial recognition is broken?