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Comment by t1234s | Hacker News Reader

I doubt the surveillance state is going away any time soon.

Company directly lies to governing body of city. Is found out the next day. Loses contract. Attacks city online afterwards.

This isn’t about surveillance states, it’s about companies run by idiots.

Why not both?

Ironically, Flock might create enough backlash to trigger regulations against surveillance. They're certainly an example of what not to do.

While police just use fleets of drones. Hardly any backlash there.

Police in America is so beyond cooked that the entire system needs to be rethought. It's just not working from any angle. It's expensive as all living fuck, with the majority of city budgets going to the police. It doesn't prevent crime. Traffic violations are still rampant, including speeding and reckless driving. And, worst of all, nobody likes it. People complain constantly and police basically just whine about how hard their job is.

Who is this for, really? Is this just a complex money-siphoning scheme to extract funds out of local governments?

This just sounds like the standard playbook for this crowd (by which wide brush I mean authoritarians and their enablers). They really hate being called on their lies, and their immediate response is to attack with whatever comes to hand (press release, xeet, the DoJ…depends on the person).

> this crowd

These companies are tech bros - they are selling to the authoritarians and they are increasingly their enablers, funders and biggest sycophants.

Re ICE having access to data: "Flock said that they did not, when they did, but that it was not their problem".

Just like it's "not their problem" that in a state where certain types of data sharing is not permitted. There's nothing they'll change in the agency's account to prevent it. They'll even offer training on it. Because it's "not their problem".

What if the surveillance state is also run by idiots?

It wont go down willingly but its possible

For all the privacy and competence issues, if it helps cops solve crimes while sitting on their asses, it's going to win.

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