Hacker News Reader

Comment by maeln | Hacker News Reader

I don't really understand the purpose especially after reading the "Why do this" part. If you need body cam evidence in a case, isn't the PD obligated to give it ? And in anycase, how will you have access to the body cam ? In my country, body cam is still not a thing so I really have no idea how the recording are used in practice, but it was my understanding that the PD has to give it if asked. Unless this tool can retrieve data that was "erased" (i.e the police officer trying to cover their track) ?

View on HN

When the PD is asked to turn over the evidence, there is a lot they can do to stall and in some cases lose track of camera or files outright [0]. When you have some generations of body cams in use - such as the Axon 1st generation and non-online 2nd generation - with no formal encryption or verification system, you certainly open the possibility for foul play. The cam files are recoverable as flat files on a disk and are easily modified. So if you look at the chain of evidence, there's a big gap with these cameras. If you have the device in hand, you have access to rewrite the record and claim "missing footage" or that the camera was off [1].

[0] https://www.propublica.org/article/the-nypd-isnt-giving-crit...

[1] https://www.wqad.com/article/news/local/the-missing-50-minut...

Police departments in the US have a long and storied history of conveniently "losing" or "accidentally erasing" evidence when that evidence would either negatively[1] impact a criminal prosecution or reveal police malfeasance.

[1]: Meaning, negatively for the prosecution.

What does having a script to eject said footage out of the device help in this case?

As 'aenario said: scripts like these dispel the following narratives:

* That police cameras are tamper-proof.

* That the police are capable of responsibly handling the data they record (cf. the recent Twitter thread about eBay-purchased cameras).

* That cameras are an effective and fool-proof check on police malfeasance.

But even beyond that: if I was a defense attorney whose client was the subject of police harassment, I wouldn't trust any footage turned over by the police. I'd want to have the original recording device itself imaged by my own consultant.

I think it's not really meant to be used and more along the line of disproving the fabricant-police claims of these devices being tamper-proof and therefore proper evidences.

In addition to this, I still don't understand how you are going to get physical access to said body cam, am I missing something?

eBay has tons

>If you need body cam evidence in a case, isn't the PD obligated to give it ?

Do you trust the police to not "accidentally delete" or otherwise misplace the data?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com