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Comment by jakelazaroff | Hacker News Reader

This would be terrible — as written, the bill would also ban red light and speeding cameras. These are some of our most effective tools for traffic law enforcement; for instance, speeding cameras in NYC resulted in a 94% (!!!) reduction in speeding where they're installed [1].

I want to see Flock banned as much as the next person, but we can't throw the baby out with the bathwater here.

[1] https://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/pr2025/nyc-dot-speed-camer...

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Funny, I have exactly the opposite point of view. I hate the red light and speeding cameras because they catch normal people who don’t bother hiding their license plates (or have license plates at all). And I don’t mind Flock and its ilk for catching more serious criminals. Basically I’m optimizing for the 90% case. Law abiding drivers who make the occasional mistake when driving.

The problem is that a private company holds onto the data forever. Then the government can ask the private company for that data without a warrant. With the number of Flock cameras (I'm upset at how many have popped up near me), it's turning into a record of all of your movements. And that record lasts forever and can be queries at any time.

You mentioned "more serious crimes", but what about the case where LEOs in Texas track women who go to get an abortion in another state? Or police officers who stalk their exes? Or an oppressive government that wants to know who went to a protest? Once the tool exists you can't assume it's only going to be used in a way you like.

In the US, there are around 40k deaths from motor vehicle crashes per year [1]. Who do you think is behind the wheel for most of those?

The point of these cameras is not to "catch" people speeding or running red lights, but to prevent them from doing it in the first place; the idea is that normal law abiding drivers are more likely to drive carefully if they are likely to be fined for their mistakes. Optimizing for the 90% case would mean supporting their rollout.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in...

> I hate the red light and speeding cameras because they catch normal people who don’t bother hiding their license plates (or have license plates at all).

The same cameras could also alert the police down the road about a car with unreadable or missing license plates.

If you are driving around without a license plate, you have other (law enforcement) problems

In Aotearoa I noticed the same effect in tye early 1990s with "speed cameras", as we called them

It took six months, but the change in traffic flows was dramatic, and good.

There is zero chance this happens. Chuy Garcia is already out the door; this is his last term. This is purely performative; the only reason it's surviving on the front page (where "proposed legislation" is by longstanding precedent off-topic) is because Wired wrote a whole clickbait story about it.

Garcia's own municipality, with a progressive mayor, vehemently disagrees with this proposed amendment. So does the blue state he represents.

GOOD. Those cameras are absolutely an infringement on 5th Amendment rights.

Speeding cameras are automated speed traps.

Not a very revelatory deduction.

California law, not deduction.

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