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Comment by svoncin | Hacker News Reader

> “I was a Technical Surveillance Officer for 15 years, so I built stuff to hide video, audio, and other covert gear,” Roberts is quoted as saying in the post. “You really don’t want your sensitive police equipment discovered, so I’d disguise it as something else, like a piece of street furniture or a household item. The variety of tools and equipment I used then really shaped what I do today.”

People are really complaining about this? This is incredibly cool from a maker perspective. And I bet he caught a load of very dodgy people with his kit too. This guy sounds awesome, what a splendid hire.

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The bigger problem I think is that they acted as if

> "Folks I'm not exactly a police supporter but this is a terrible way to intro Tony. You've basically written this guy specialises in surveillance and now he works with our computers, yay!"

was not an acceptable response to that. Some people don't like surveillance, not that surprising, but if you end up with "oops, wrong audience for this" post you don't have to blow it up as they did.

So I found the original thread (https://raspberrypi.social/@Raspberry_Pi/109477121398103132), and I must say these irreverent responses from the Raspberry Pi account are raising a smile from me, it's refreshing to see someone not taking those po-faced complainer types seriously.

It's refreshing that people respectfully voice their concerns and the company treats them like shit in response, going so far as to reply condescendingly and block them? That's not refreshing, that's just shitty behaviour and unacceptable in the context of any community.

Definitely, it just makes me respect the Raspberry Pi team even more than I did already. Sticking up for their new colleague, and shutting down all those pompous whiners with ego-puncturing flippancy. I love to see it.

The problem isn't whether or not he caught dodgy people. The problem is that in the process "I bet" he spied on a lot of people who were not dodgy, who had the right to have their privacy respected.

He worked on the technical support for targeted surveillance of serious organised crime and terror threats. So if you look at this realistically, no, his kit wouldn't have been used to spy on people who weren't at least suspected of being dodgy.

> This is incredibly cool from a maker perspective.

Sophisticated IEDs and weaponized drones are incredibly cool from a maker perspective, too. That doesn't make celebrating them any less reprehensible.

I'm glad you come from a place of sufficient privilege to trust cops to keep you safe. Not all of us are so fortunate.

You will hopefully be relieved to learn that TSOs specialise in covert evidence-gathering technologies for serious crime investigations, and are not making machines to blow your legs off or shoot your face in.

They're part of the teams taking down human trafficking rings, violent gangs involved in the drugs trade, terrorist cells, and suchlike. The kind of high impact police work that helps make vulnerable people's lives safer.

> They're part of the teams taking down human trafficking rings, violent gangs involved in the drugs trade, terrorist cells, and suchlike.

They're part of the teams surveilling and even outright harassing civilians on mere suspicion of tangential connection to crime - the kind of polie work that makes people's lives vulnerable in the first place.

It shouldn't be surprising that not everyone shares your enthusiasm for the state's goons, no matter how "cool" their goonery-enabling gadgets might be.

Right - in fact UK police specifically have engaged in seriously unethical behaviour: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/oct/28/secrets-and-...

That is a very ignorant opinion to be flaunting with such confidence.

It's the precise opposite of an ignorant opinion; it's in fact rather well-informed from myself being a former employee of a law enforcement agency. You can parrot copaganda pamphlets all you like, but the idea that police are always the good guys and only spy on the public for the public's good is dangerously naive.

Really, which country? Presumably not the UK.

The power dynamics involved are universal - and as has been linked elsewhere in this thread, the UK is no exception.

So, not the UK then. Thought as much.

Whatever issue you have with the law enforcement people you apparently worked alongside for a while, please refrain from blindly transferring this onto UK police personnel whose work you have zero insight into.

> So, not the UK then.

The power dynamics involved are universal - and as has been linked elsewhere in this thread, the UK is no exception.

> please refrain from blindly transferring this onto UK police personnel

There's nothing "blind" about it - because again, the power dynamics are universal, and has has been linked elsewhere in this thread, the UK is no exception.

Cops are cops. They are definitionally given special privileges and powers over the general population, and the temptation to abuse those special privileges and powers doesn't magically go away just because you choose to plug your ears and pretend they have your best interests at heart. There's a reason why the phrase "All Cops Are Bastards" originated in the UK of all places.

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