Illinois prohibits weapons, facial recognition on police drones

https://ilga.gov/legislation/fulltext.asp?DocName=&SessionId=112&GA=103&DocTypeId=HB&DocNum=3902&GAID=17&LegID=149171&SpecSess=&Session=

by Kon-Peki • 3 years ago

447 218 3 years ago

ilga.gov

rootusrootus• 3 years ago

Is this a new restriction on existing practices, or legislation that enables more functionality with police drones as long as it doesn't include weapons or facial recognition? I get an entirely different vibe from every other discussion on this legislation than from the headline of this post.

Kon-Peki2• 3 years ago

As you can see from the text (signed by the governor today; effective immediately), this is a new restriction. All underlined text is newly added to the law. Text with a strikethrough is removed from the law.

The law also adds many new data reporting obligations, and empowers the Attorney General to investigate (with teeth) violations.

starttoaster• 3 years ago

Police departments in the US basically don’t require legislation to add new functionality to their policing mechanisms, they require laws to tell them what they cannot do. So more the former than the latter. But it doesn’t really matter with this for the average citizen, most likely. They’ll only ever use the drones for big busts. Most cops just sit in traffic until they get bored and chase down random beater cars that were going 5 over the speed limit, or pulled slightly too far forward at a stop sign that had shrubs blocking the left and right view.

RajT886• 3 years ago

Most cops just sit in traffic until they get bored and chase down random beater cars that were going 5 over the speed limit, or pulled slightly too far forward at a stop sign that had shrubs blocking the left and right view.

That's also problematic!

samwillis• 3 years ago

As a Brit, watching the militarisation of the US police force is kinda scary. Hearing about successful push back and positive legislation is good.

A quick bit of Googling, I can't find any evidence of weapons a being placed on police drones in Illinois, so this seems preemptive, which is good to see!

(Our own police force has many of its own problems)

smoldesu• 3 years ago

Wait until you see how we've militarized the domestically-incorporated information systems that we export.

femiagbabiaka2• 3 years ago

I knew it was an issue when a rural town of at best 2000 people adjacent to where my wife grew up successfully purchased multiple Humvees for "riot control" through 1033 (a program instituted by a president from the equivalent of a blairite-ish labour party in our country, no less).

More about that here: https://www.marketplace.org/2020/06/12/police-departments-10...

hutzlibu• 3 years ago

Nitpick about purchased

“It’s a transfer, so that means that the agencies don’t have to pay for this equipment. So because the government has already possessed it, paid for it, it’s the Department of Defense’s property.”

It seems technically it is still DoD property?

But alltogether it is indeed worrysome. Here in germany we have the same trend, even though quite light in comparison.

It is rare nowdays, that I see police without bulletproof wests and machine pistols are more and more common. It creates a very different impression ...

Speaking of it: my car broke down once and I parked it on the side of a rural road (not in the way). It was weekend and I put a big note in it, saying it will be towed away very soon.

Monday morning my wife with the baby were suprised by police on the door. And the first thing they see is the machine pistol and fighting gear.

Surely totally necessary to get the same information, they could have gotten from the note in the car (that this very day it will be moved away). I seriously don't know what they were thinking. Probably nothing at all and war gear becomes just standard for engaging with potentially dangerous civilians, who park their car next to the road.

RajT886• 3 years ago

Sort of like how Naperville has APC's, but also somehow is "The Safest Place in America". (That title is a fraud, btw, and the result of systemic non-prosecution, non-reporting, and reduction of felonies to lesser crimes. But they indeed don't have much of a gang violence problem - just major drug problems which go unaddressed.)

LeFantome• 3 years ago

Axon has openly floated the idea.

FredPret• 3 years ago

What's scary is the number of CCTV cameras throughout Britain (not just London). I've never felt more surveilled than on a recent visit there.

Zetice5• 3 years ago

How does one "feel surveilled"?

ajhurliman• 3 years ago

China is pretty bad too, I’m sure that comes as no surprise to most.

jessfyi• 3 years ago

After law enforcement successfully jury-rigged a bomb defusal robot with explosives to kill a cornered suspect in Dallas in 2016 [0][1] (with little to no pushback at the time) vendors and departments around the country have been pushing to formally adopt the tactic ever since. The first article noted (according to national head of their union) that SWAT teams around the country considered it prior to that incident. SFPD initially getting approval to do it brought national attention [2] to the practice, but unfortunately we're going to need a federal bill to stop its spread.

[0] https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/07/08/485262777... [1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jul/08/police-bo... [2] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/12/san-francisco-decide...

reaperducer3• 3 years ago

As a Brit, watching the militarisation of the US police force is kinda scary.

You should watch it from this side.

Even people who aren't minorities and have never done anything wrong in their lives are starting to distrust and shy away from the police.

It's one reason that so many (most?) police departments are understaffed.

Fernicia• 3 years ago

How do you balance this concern with the level of crime? Wouldn't be more excusable for a Johannesburg PD to be better equipped than Brighton?

With that in mind, it doesn't seem right to paint the US with one brush when Chicago's murder rate is more than 5x higher than New York City's. For the case of small PDs having big budgets I agree it's wasted money, and maybe even damaging to the town.

But in urban areas like Detroit, Baltimore, and Chicago, it seems tone-deaf to focus on police violence when so many people are victimised by people the police could have locked up if they were better equipped. (Ignoring of course the weakness of courts to imprison violent offenders, which is also a huge issue in London.)

jollyllama• 3 years ago

The facial recognition isn't on the drone, the cop just uploads the footage to a tagging service *trollface*

bs7280• 3 years ago

Illinois has very strong anti facial recognition / biometric law. Theres been a lot of class action lawsuits recently. I got like $300 from the facebook settlement alone.

So this loophole wouldn't work either fortunately

stonedge• 3 years ago

This is true, but that law (BIPA) applies to private entities. i.e., government orgs and contractors are exempt. Regardless, this new legislation is good. I would like to see the complete inclusion of government organizations into needing to acquire consent.

https://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs3.asp?ActID=3004&C...

Kon-Peki2• 3 years ago

The law covers both scenarios, as shown in the linked text:

A law enforcement agency operating a drone under this Act is prohibited from using, during a flight, onboard facial recognition software that works in conjunction with the drone. A law enforcement agency operating a drone under this Act is prohibited from using any information gathered by a drone with any facial recognition software

sokoloff3• 3 years ago

That depends on the grouping of clauses.

Grouped as (prohibited from using any information gathered by a drone) (with any facial recognition software), you might be right.

Grouped as (prohibited from using any information gathered by a (drone with any facial recognition software)), I don't think you're right. Personally, I would naturally group the clauses in this way and conclude that off-drone facial recognition was not effectively barred by this statute but onboard facial recognition was.

zitterbewegung• 3 years ago

I got a $400 settlement from Facebook when they did facial recognition in violation of a similar law. IANAL but if / when they try it I will probably get another settlement.

HumblyTossed• 3 years ago

What? You mean we don't need a bunch of people dying because cops misinterpreted what they saw on crappy, jittery 1080p night time footage?

Instant downvote. I guess someone wants to see that on YouTube.

shipscode• 3 years ago

The title confused me a bit, Illinois isn't prohibiting weapon recognition on drones, it's prohibiting putting weapons on drones.

Also, the act doesn't appear to have any legal consequences, so I wonder if it actually holds any teeth.

DonaldPShimoda2• 3 years ago

The title confused me a bit, Illinois isn't prohibiting weapon recognition on drones, it's prohibiting putting weapons on drones.

This is normal title style for a news headline and has been for a very long time; the comma here is short for "and".

piperswe2• 3 years ago

"weapons" should be missing the "s" to reduce ambiguity in that case. Right now it reads like (weapons) and (facial recognition). "weapons recognition" doesn't quite sound right to me.

LadyCailin• 3 years ago

If they did, then you could successfully sue them for an injunction. Further use would then be contempt of court, a separate crime. Further, any evidence derived from that would be inadmissible in any proceedings.

remyp• 3 years ago

As an Illinois resident, voter, and taxpayer, I'm pleased by this. I don't think I've never been _happy_ with Illinois politicians, but this current set is meaningfully productive enough for me to consider plausible the idea of being happy with my government.

hisnameishank• 3 years ago

Illinois also just banned the practice of banning books :)

eksx• 3 years ago

I have to say that definitely makes me happy!

hinkley5• 3 years ago

The Illinois education board always had a soft spot for banned books. I was legally required to read two of them for my schools to retain accreditation. But we actually read 3 1/2.

RajT886• 3 years ago

I don't think I've never been _happy_ with Illinois politicians

Occasionally, I'm happy with the amount of jail time they get.

faitswulff• 3 years ago

It's a treasured Illinois tradition

hinkley5• 3 years ago

A particular treat for residents of Illinois and New York.

monksy3• 3 years ago

The state reps seem to be better.

But our federal senators are pretty awful tankies. (Durban and Duckworth.. they'll full on send you a tone death letter about why encryption is awful after you send them your concerns)

JustFigItOut• 3 years ago

I'm curious how they qualify as tankies? Neither of them are even socialist let alone some kind of authoritarian communist.

_3vxq• 3 years ago

I don't like tankies, but what about that makes them a tankie rather than merely authoritarian?

brian_herman• 3 years ago

This and the privacy laws that illinois has like the Personal Information Protection act make me happy too. https://www.varonis.com/blog/illinois-privacy-law

oh_sigh2• 3 years ago

I don't understand the issue with facial recognition if it is only used as a lead, and isn't considered evidence in and of itself, and a person's rights are respected even if they are flagged by the facial recognition software. If the issue is disparate success rates between races or other demographics, then let's just fuzz the incoming data until it's all equal. Facial recognition still sounds like an incredibly useful tool.

Banning facial recognition sounds to me like the legislature knows that the police force abuses people and will abuse people even more with facial recognition. Instead of banning tools that can increase the scope for abuse, why not try rooting out the people and culture perpetrating abuse in the first place?

mulmen10• 3 years ago

If I am flagged by facial recognition software my rights have already been violated.

This is a bad idea even before we consider that LEO is composed of fallible human beings with an established history of abusing the information systems they already possess.

oh_sigh2• 3 years ago

What right of yours was violated if you were flagged by facial recognition?

localplume• 3 years ago

agree. the technology is exceptionally useful and banning it doesn't stop already corrupt LEO from fudging evidence. they should be removed entirely. individually, many forms of evidence in forensic science are complete BS but as part of a whole they add value. its the same with facial recognition. this is just a kneejerk reaction that sounds good on headlines and for politics but doesn't actually help anyone.

99_00• 3 years ago

It makes much more sense to ban facial recognition instead of addressing corruption and incompetence in a state like Illinois.

1.) Progressive voters get good feelings as they think they are helping 'minorities' and advancing social justice.

2.) Politicians please a large segment of voters.

3.) People who benefit from corruption are not threatened as the status quo is maintained.

4.) Politicians's in power is not threatened by the system as the status quo is maintained.

The corrupt system only negatively impacts people who can't afford a good private lawyer.

mulmen10• 3 years ago

Drone means flying drones here. What about land based robots? Can they still put a shotgun on one of those to blow away a suspicious package? Can they still use a robot to breach a door? Can they use facial recognition software on footage recovered from a land based drone?

RajT886• 3 years ago

It's a good point. I would hope there's an exemption for bomb disposal robots, because functionally there's not that much difference between these and (basically) Killbotz:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSkYxW5Ii28

mulmen10• 3 years ago

Bomb robots seem fine to me in an appropriate context. An alternative is a high power rifle at range, although that does seem a lot more dangerous.

I’m more concerned about militarized pizza delivery robots. If they can’t have flying drones will they have rolling ones instead? Seems odd to carve this out for only flying drones.

sangnoir3• 3 years ago

There shouldn't be an exemption on the equipment, but prohibition of using anything as a killbot. Dallas police used a bomb-disposal robot to remotely deliver a bomb to kill a suspect some years back.

https://www.texastribune.org/2016/07/08/use-robot-kill-dalla...

hinkley5• 3 years ago

Are we equating suspicious packages with suspicious humans?

You’ve made a bizarre slippery slope scenario here with much bigger ethical implications than the one you’re focused on.

mulmen10• 3 years ago

Why would we equate suspicious packages with humans?

h2odragon• 3 years ago

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/robot-delivered-lethal-...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_shooting_of_Dallas_police...

midnitewarrior2• 3 years ago

This is terrifying that we need this kind of regulation.

kylevedder• 3 years ago

Using the existence of regulation as proof that the regulation is needed is circular reasoning.

midnitewarrior2• 3 years ago

It's terrifying that we live in a world where a legislator saw the need to regulate this while I am not disagreeing with the need for this once brought to my attention.

abeppu8• 3 years ago

Can we get a federal bill with the same prohibitions? It would be absurd if the right to be free from fear of automated death from the skies is left to a patchwork of state and local restrictions.

Irresponsible arguments that I would totally not be surprised to hear to push in the opposite direction:

- If law enforcement doesn't have armed drones, we live in a world where only the criminals have armed drones.

- Sometimes law enforcement must be able to use deadly force. Isn't it better if in those situations, officers aren't also putting their lives at risk?

- Currently, when law enforcement uses deadly force, one of the strongest defenses is that in the moment, an officer felt that their own life was at risk. A drone operator has no such fear and therefore no bias towards using weapons prematurely.

mulmen10• 3 years ago

I get the argument for federal laws but honestly I think it is misguided to want state laws promoted to a national level immediately. This is how law in the US evolves. The patchwork is a feature. A federal government with the agility to implement this law at a national level would have far too much power. The system is working.

craigmcnamara• 3 years ago

We should promote this patch to production ASAP

ryandrake• 3 years ago

I agree. It's helpful to remember: for every law you like and want promoted to the federal level, there's another law you probably don't like that someone else thinks would be great to promote to the federal level. Although moving states to flee terrible laws is a burden, it's not as much of a burden as fleeing your entire country. Laws should be as local as practically possible.

abeppu8• 3 years ago

In general, I understand and am sympathetic to the idea of the states as being laboratories for democracy, etc.

However, in this case:

- The US federal government already has and has used drones as weapons overseas, including to kill US citizens. This now includes smaller/cheaper drones.

- The US federal government has materially supported the militarization of police forces, including by giving them military equipment.

- Federal law enforcement agencies operate everywhere in the country, and IIUC their behavior isn't limited by those state laws (e.g. the state of CA can't pass a law that removes the CBP "100-mile border zone" and restricts them to only operating at borders and ports), and IIUC the FBI already flies surveillance flights (though the facial recognition prohibition likely doesn't apply here).

nathan_compton4• 3 years ago

Doesn't this kind of depend on the law? Do you really think "guns and and facial recognition on drones" is the kind of thing we have to do experiments on? I kind of get where you're coming from in the sense that it is scary for so much power over so many people to be concentrated in such a small place, but, on the other hand, when the case is simple or the moral calculus is clear enough, I think we ought not feel a strong compunction against action at a federal level.

abeppu8• 3 years ago

To be clear, I _also_ would strongly prefer the facial recognition prohibition be national (and also apply to non-drone-based cameras that police have access to). But clearly literal killer drones are worse than mere spy drones.

xtreme• 3 years ago

What are good counters to these arguments?

reaperducer3• 3 years ago

What are good counters to these arguments?

Mostly it comes down to the companies that make these things have to "maximize shareholder value." Who cares if people get killed?

It's good to see Illinois get ahead of this, considering that politicians in Illinois keep getting caught taking bribes from these policing equipment companies that peddle gadgets like red light cameras.

Just yesterday it was revealed that the newly elected mayor of Chicago authorized the extension of the ShotSpotter contract another ten years: One of the very things he promised to kill when he was campaigning.

It's all been "Oops! Is that my signature!? I didn't know that other people have the ability to click a button and sign my name to multi-million dollar contracts. Oh, well, maybe next decade!"

abeppu8• 3 years ago

I'll bite:

The response to "then only criminals will have armed drones" is: Ok, let's give all the cops a lot of drugs and child porn, because it would be bad if only criminals had that stuff, and maybe we can give them anthrax and components for a dirty bomb, because it would be bad if only terrorists had those. Or maybe, that's a broken line of reasoning and law enforcement isn't a war in which enemies must be met with equal means.

The answer to "sometimes police have to use deadly force; isn't it better if their lives aren't at stake is": We live in a world where kids having fun on the internet will have other people 'swatted'. This is only possible because police are willing to arm themselves and suddenly and forcefully enter a situation where they have _no credible information_ about any kind of threat. Until they demonstrate some capacity to consistently identify whether a situation requires deadly force, it's irresponsible to give them more of it.

The response to the "police who use deadly force inappropriately may have felt their life was at risk" is ... all the videos of police killings where an unarmed person is running away, an unarmed person is already effectively restrained, etc etc. Police use deadly force even when there is clearly no threat. Making police safer isn't the solution; the rest of us need to be safe from the police.

5423542342352• 3 years ago

I'll add to abeppu's arguments.

If law enforcement doesn't have armed drones, we live in a world where only the criminals have armed drones.

If criminals have guns, police should have body armor and maybe also guns. If criminals have automatic guns, police should not have automatic guns because 99% of their job has no connection to those encounters and they are a huge force that interacts with the public constantly, so treating it at an occupying force is a terrible idea. Armed drones don’t fight each other. Having armed drones doesn’t protect police, or anyone, from armed drones that criminals may or may not have.

Sometimes law enforcement must be able to use deadly force. Isn't it better if in those situations, officers aren't also putting their lives at risk?

Taking the life of a fellow citizen is a huge amount of power given by the government. If the government can take citizen’s lives with no risk and no locality, there can be no accountability. Real people going out and enforcing the law is a check, as imperfect as it is, on what laws and how far the government can go. If a warehouse of drone operators outside of DC can open fire on protestors in Albuquerque, there is no accountability.

Currently, when law enforcement uses deadly force, one of the strongest defenses is that in the moment, an officer felt that their own life was at risk. A drone operator has no such fear and therefore no bias towards using weapons prematurely.

DOJ investigations show again and again that shootings are the result of systemic issues within the police force. Just as one example, the Clevand PD was investigated after the Tamir Rice murder and found a pattern of excessive force, substandard training, and unconstitutional practices. From the report. "The employment of poor and dangerous tactics that place officers in situations where avoidable force becomes inevitable and places officers and civilians at unnecessary risk…We found that CDP officers too often use unnecessary and unreasonable force in violation of the Constitution. Supervisors tolerate this behavior and, in some cases, endorse it. Officers report that they receive little supervision, guidance, and support from the Division, essentially leaving them to determine for themselves how to perform their difficult and dangerous jobs." The DOJ specifically states that Cleveland PD use excessive force, including deadly force, at a "significant rate" and that excessive and deadly force was a pattern, and not isolated incidences. [1]

Making it that much easier for police to use “unnecessary and unreasonable force in violation of the Constitution” is not going to make things safer for anyone.

[1] https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press-releas...

glitchc2• 3 years ago

A federal law can only apply to FBI, National Guard, Coast Guard and other federally managed law enforcement bodies. It cannot apply to the various state and county police authorities. Governance of those is a right explicitly granted to each state and county, and the states/counties will fight tooth and nail to retain it.

bigbillheck• 3 years ago

Usually what happens is the feds don't legislate it directly but tie it to acceptance of federal funding.

karaterobot2• 3 years ago

They'd just use federal funding as leverage. "If you want these federal dollars, you'll abide by the following..." If the 10th amendment went to war with the Spending Power clause, I know who I'd put money on!

MereInterest• 3 years ago

That doesn't quite make sense to me. A federal policy or a federal executive order only applying to federally-managed bodies, I could understand. But federal laws outweigh state and local laws.

abeppu8• 3 years ago

65% of the US population is within the 100-mile border zone in which CBP operates -- I think they shouldn't have drones with facial recognition abilities.

In 2015 there was a bunch of press around the FBI running surveillance flights recording cities in the US. Recent reporting suggests that the program has continued (using the same shell companies and names). This would be even harder for citizens to find out about if they were using smaller drones).

If federal agencies were prohibited from using drones to surveil citizens en masse, and prohibited from arming drones, I think we'd all benefit. If we also had a federal prohibiting 1033 transfers of military drones with arms or facial recognition, I would also consider that to be a win.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-14/mapping-w...

https://www.thebaltimorebanner.com/community/criminal-justic...

dghlsakjg3• 3 years ago

Federal laws absolutely apply to local government and their agencies.

The death penalty was banned in 1972 on a federal ruling of a local law (Georgia), as a consequence, all death sentences, federal and state, were commuted to life.

There are a TON of federal laws that apply to local law enforcement. At this moment there are several local police departments that are being actively monitored and controlled by the DOJ due to unconstitutional activity.

gnopgnip• 3 years ago

This is an oversimplification. Certain federal laws are limited to federal law enforcement, where there is exclusive federal jurisdiction, because these powers are reserved for the states. Other federal laws apply to everyone, to every state. Because it effects interstate commerce or it is related to a constitutional right, like the fifth amendment right to due process

karaterobot2• 3 years ago

The argument against it being federal is that such a bill would likely be the result of a lot more compromises, chipped away at by a lot more parties. Which makes sense, as it would have a lot more stakeholders, and a lot more at stake.

The feds also have a stronger tendency to make bigger, dumber, more invasive enforcement mechanisms that end up creating new and unforeseen problems.

dpratt• 3 years ago

There is no way this would ever even pass initial consideration at the Federal level, in that there is no incentive for the Federal government to limit the weaponry available to it's law enforcement apparatus. They would see such a law as containing no upside for the government itself, and therefore it will be, at best, laughed out of committee and more likely any Congressman or Senator who proposes it will mysteriously find that a lot of his or her donors are suddenly turning on him.

thesuperbigfrog2• 3 years ago

> Can we get a federal bill with the same prohibitions? It would be absurd if the right to be free from fear of automated death from the skies is left to a patchwork of state and local restrictions.
> - Sometimes law enforcement must be able to use deadly force. Isn't it better if in those situations, officers aren't also putting their lives at risk?

What about drones that can be used to deploy non-lethal weapons?

For example, if police need to employ riot control gas (https://emergency.cdc.gov/agent/riotcontrol/factsheet.asp) to disperse a violent mob, a drone could fly over the mob and drop the gas.

Should that be permitted?

throwbadubadu• 3 years ago

Nope, "violent mobs" are something that if it exists and rich enough modern democratic societies (and others) that is effect of some cause that needs immediate fixing, even beating them just down is maybe too much - I know I'm a bit too idealistic and romantic (:

But no, please let us not starts with robots/machines fighting our own society but fix it, drones in warfare are already enough of an ethical problem..

hanniabu• 3 years ago

Probably won't happen, but I bet they'll pass something like that for civilian drones

nradov• 3 years ago

We already have a federal bill that prohibits dangerous weapons on drones. It is the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018. As far as I can tell the law doesn't have any exceptions for civilian law enforcement.

https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/drones-and-weapons-dangerous-mi...

EMCymatics• 3 years ago

Put that in the assault weapon ban.

numpad0• 3 years ago

Not a US resident and certainly not a lawyer, but are armed vehicles legal in the first place? I thought weapon mounts on airplanes and drones are forbidden by FAA regulations, and BATFE rules on ground vehicles. Weapons that fire more than once per one depression of a fire button are also defined machine guns and are regulated.

Military branches including national guards are exempted from all above, but it’s generally illegal in a modern nation, even some dictatorships, for a military branch to be both an external facing defense force and an internal facing police organization at the same time by mission, as allowing it leads to unrests and coups. So handling of such vehicles and devices can’t be normally outsourced to military.

I think this is just another case of honest but uninformed people adding more and more ad-hoc and redundant laws without enforcement. Not that I oppose the spirit of this particular law though.

tekknik• 3 years ago

Irresponsible arguments that I would totally not be surprised to hear to push in the opposite direction:

I don’t disagree with some of your statements, but why are you trying to preemptively shut the conversation down?

RobotToaster• 3 years ago

The fact they need a law to stop the police using UCAVs against civilians is terrifying.

nemo44x• 3 years ago

You have to think about the incentives at play. Imagine you're a police chief or some kind of similar decision maker in a government organization. You have certain metrics you need to hit as dictated by elected politicians and non-elected supervisors, etc. You have a "job to do" and you're being measured by the outcomes you produce. Your career and wellbeing depends on this.

So what do you expect them to do? They absolutely need a law that says they can't use a certain technique/technology/etc because they'd be deemed incompetent for not using them if they were missing their metrics. So you use them unless you have a law that says you can't. Then you have an out.

It's not like these are evil people. They want the same things you do in the end. But they have a specific job to do with goals to pursue and what do you expect them to do?

Incentives drive behavior.

testplzignore• 3 years ago

This Act does not prohibit the use of a drone by a law enforcement agency [...] to forestall [...] the destruction of evidence

So, essentially nothing is prohibited. "Destruction of evidence" can be flushing drugs down the toilet or throwing them out a car window. The war on drugs greatly increases how many "crimes" are being committed at any given time and what is considered evidence of those crimes.

jimt12342• 3 years ago

Is anything ever really prohibited (for US law enforcement)? Better yet, what are the real consequences for violation? All I ever hear is, "Okay, fine. We won't do this illegal thing anymore - you know, the thing we've been doing for years, knowing it's totally illegal. Sorry, not sorry." Without consequences for violation, there is no prohibition.

jimt12342• 3 years ago

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/4053686-minneapo...

Expect heads to roll at the Minneapolis PD. Just kidding. Nothing will happen. Not even a slap on the wrist.

paws• 3 years ago

Slightly OT: I noticed Colorado, Connecticut, New Mexico, and New York City either ended or limited qualified immunity in recent years. (In other states similar efforts faltered, apparently thanks to police unions and politicians in their pocket [0])

Via the article:

Fifteen months after the Colorado bill was signed into law, there is so far little evidence to support any widespread negative effects on police retention or recruitment.

Now that it's been more time I've been curious to measure how curtailing QI has affected 1) police misconduct 2) police hiring and 3) insurance rates (e.g. indemnity) municipalities/townships/states pay.

If anyone has insight on ways to measure, places to find data, etc would be appreciated.

Meanwhile for those curious about Chicago police misconduct, TIL about [1]

[0] https://archive.ph/evcEG

[1] https://cpdp.co

hinkley5• 3 years ago

I’m not at “defund police” levels of dissatisfaction but I do believe they have fundamentally lost the moral authority to self govern. I think internal affairs should be disbanded and we go straight to the FBI without passing IA.

JimtheCoder2• 3 years ago

"and we go straight to the FBI"

Because they are so much better, right?

dghlsakjg3• 3 years ago

We just need to separate IA from the agency it is investigating.

Up here in BC, Canada, the office of the Police Complaint Commissioner is responsible for investigating policing complaints. They aren't associated with any agency, and have broad investigative authorities.

It isn't a perfect system, but it is far better than police investigating their own agency, or even police investigating other nearby agencies.

I also think that police unions need to go. They should be lumped in with other public employee unions, or just accept that a job that powerful does not need a traditional union.

PM_me_your_math2• 3 years ago

The FBI groomed a mentally disabled kid into what they define as a terrorist. If you think the FBI isn't filled with bad actors, then you haven't been paying attention.

z3c03• 3 years ago

I would love to see an equivalent to cpdp.co for every city. The notion of publicly humiliating authoritarian thugs masquerading as civil servants offers a glimmer of hope for the atrocious state of policing in the US.

hinkley5• 3 years ago

Second City has been busy this month.

What’s goin on there?

cma• 3 years ago

If there is a bomb that can be dismantled by a remote operated drone with a "weapon" on it, or an armed perpetrator situation, it is kind of sadistic to make an officer go in in person instead. I can see limiting autonomous ones though.

mulmen10• 3 years ago

This law only applies to flying drones. The law doesn’t require an officer to do anything in person. It’s not sadistic. Let’s tone down the rhetoric.

Bomb disposal is fine by me, there’s plenty of time to get that right. Armed perpetrators should be dealt with by actual human officers, hopefully specialty trained SWAT. I don’t trust a webcam to differentiate between a hostage and a bad guy.

km3r• 3 years ago

Am I the only one that is OK with CCTV + facial recognition? Seems like a great way to tackle crime without having to involve potentially deadly encounters with police. Ya there are ways it could be abused, but I assume I have no privacy (as does the law) when I am in a public space. A lot cheaper than cops too. Put laws and systems in place to keep the data secure and require warrants to access the data.

(No lethal weapons on drones please though, although I could see a case for riot control drones, not sure where you would draw the line on what is a weapon.)

giraffe_lady• 3 years ago

It's not something you get instead of cops, when technology is developed for policing it's always always in addition. So it's not cops vs facial rec it's cops with facial rec.

American police have never been given a power that they have not chosen to abuse for personal or political reasons, and used against dissidents and the dispossessed. The abuses aren't theoretical they are inevitable and at huge scale.

Put laws and systems in place to keep the data secure and require warrants to access the data.

When? Who writes warrants? Who enforces these rules and punishes transgressions of them? None of these would be actual practical restrictions, and they don't exist anyway. If you give them access to it they have access to it your only chance to influence that was before you gave it to them.

Zetice5• 3 years ago

I agree with the idea that American police abuse their resources, and would abuse this resource if given the chance, and I think you mentioning it here is a great lesson for me and everyone else to remind us of the current situation for police.

Where I fall short however is the resignation that this is how things must be, or that we'll forever be unable to change these things. If we can get this police abuse under control, then the idea of using technology to help discover bad actors seems like a sound one to me.

retrac• 3 years ago

but I assume I have no privacy (as does the law) when I am in a public space.

I think we may need to slightly retweak our concept of public and private. There are very few truly private spaces, from the perspective of an entity that can see every public space simultaneously.

seanmcdirmid5• 3 years ago

We have nest cams and doorbell cams. We get very clear pictures of the person stealing packages off of our porch, but local rules (where I live) don’t allow us to apply facial recognition to those pictures to stop the madness.

plagiarist2• 3 years ago

Yeah! Why would we be frightened of constant surveillance if we have nothing to hide?

It's not as if states are writing any laws that criminalize women's healthcare, gender identity, or sexuality. And it's not as if law enforcement would ever misuse access to carry out personal vendetta. And it's not as if laws are only being enforced and prosecuted depending on who you are or what you believe.

So let's get going and put all criminals in jail and a bunch of protesters as well.

seanmcdirmid5• 3 years ago

But if you decide to take packages off my porch, don’t you obviously have something to hide. Ya, my doorbell camera has a clear picture of you taking the package, but no, the police can’t do anything about it because it isn’t a priority for them and technology can’t be used to make matching a picture to a name due to law. So you get to pirate as many packages as you want.

igorstellar• 3 years ago

It sounds completely surreal to have cameras and face id everywhere, but this is already done by our phones (face recognition) and GPS tracking, full surveillance of any messaging activity (with rare exceptions) for no good reason other than selling ads. Having less gun violence and deadly police interactions can actually use this technology for something better than just ads served by corporations (and also sell this data to anyone who pays). We should be careful about who can access these systems though.

unethical_ban• 3 years ago

People need to be able to operate outside the constant surveillance of the state. Our society is not built for 100% compliance, and that's where we go if we have constant tracking.

For one, many laws are enforced with discretion and rightly so. Second, people need to coordinate action against their government from time to time.

No, phone data and localized CCTV are not equivalent.

menus• 3 years ago

Wrongfully Accused by an Algorithm - New York Times

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/24/technology/facial-recogni...

NoMoreNicksLeft3• 3 years ago

Not just crime. It's a good way to tackle whistleblowers and investigative reporters. It's a good way to tackle peaceful protesters. It's even a good way to tackle undesirables and fugitives.

Superhuman police powers (which is what pervasive surveillance is), sound great when the cops are worried about retrieving your stolen car or bicycle. But they become nightmares quickly when the police are more concerned with crimes the public doesn't care about or think are crimes.

And the cops have been like that for decades. We should be downgrading their abilities, not upgrading them. I don't think it's completely out of the question that they only be allowed single-shot handguns where they must pull the brass with their own fingernails and reload before firing again. Honestly, there shouldn't be any cameras other than those on their bodies and in their cars used to collect evidence for trial. I'm on the fence on whether they should be allowed much electronic technology beyond that (and maybe radios).

seanmcdirmid5• 3 years ago

Not really. A lot of us are ok with it, especially if we live in high property crime areas. Something had to be done, and it doesn’t seem like policing is working very well, so why not try technology instead?

bombolo2• 3 years ago

Because it still relies on police doing their jobs, which by your admission they already aren't.

janalsncm• 3 years ago

Additionally, traffic cameras should replace most traffic cops. Cameras don’t shoot people, cops do at routine traffic stops. It is also safer for police as well, since they will be in fewer dangerous roadside situations.

Most high speed chases can be replaced by cameras too. You don’t need to pursue the suspect. There is nowhere for them to hide. Arrest them once they’re stopped.

If you think it’s dystopian to have traffic cameras sending speeding tickets then 1) maybe the actual speed limit should be higher, but enforced and 2) getting a fine is better than getting shot.

tinyhouse• 3 years ago

Instead of fixing issues like bias with facial recognition, they prefer to ban it instead. And Illinois of all places, where the crime is out of control. Who will suffer the most? you guess it right, those who they are trying to protect... Go figure.

xp84• 3 years ago

I don't think bias is the main problem with FR. I think the problem is more of the police performing mass FR. Although perfect FR by a (fictional) benevolent police force could allow much easier capture of all criminals, I think most Americans are more afraid of an all-powerful police force made possible by FR than they are of the status quo that many criminals go uncaught for a long time (and possibly forever). And I think that the militaristic behavior of cops and police departments have earned that.

The (hopefully) hyperbolic version of this fear is: Say you were wanted for a crime, and nobody believed you (or perhaps you're guilty but it's a BS law). If it's perfectly legal for them to do so, maybe the cops will just fly a killdrone over places you're known to frequent and shoot you on sight, and say 'Gee, sorry if you were offended, but (Name) was a dangerous criminal, wanted for terrorism and refused to turn himself in, we had no choice.'

dogsgobork• 3 years ago

Illinois of all places, where the crime is out of control

Is it? From what I've found Illinois is fairly middle of the pack vs other states.

1123581321• 3 years ago

Much of the state is peaceful, balanced out by high crime rates in parts of Chicago and in mid-sized cities (Rockford, Aurora, Peoria, Springfield.)

screye• 3 years ago

It's sad that the advent of new technology is never viewed as an opportunity to reduce violence.

If the police can put themselves out of harms way using a drone, doesn't that help with peaceful de-escalation? A drone opens up options like tasers and pepper spray, that would have otherwise been impossible for police to deploy at a distance. If facial recognition can be done with near 100% accuracy, then what's wrong with it being used to identify the location of someone who has committed a life sentence worthy crime ?

I agree that drones and facial recognition should never be fully automated as a robotic civilian disposal system. But when used responsibly, the tools are much better options than what we have today : Guns. a GTA car chase can be swiftly stopped using drones. Don't need an expensive helicopter and a rampaging maniac to kill someone at 150 mph.

We are teaching kids what to do in the case of a school shooter, and arming school guards to the teeth. Schools have the hardware for facial recognition cameras. A manual "choose target -> hone in -> shoot pepper spray" mechanism is less dangerous and immediately neutralizes a threat. Yes, the rest of the kids are likely to get very painful chillies in their eyes, but you saved their lives. (I'll admit this one is stretch)

Yes, it seems dystopian because movies portray it as dystopian. But in the modern world, the state has total monopoly over violence. We already live in a surveillance state, and the worst case outcome is already as bad as it can get (death). Using tech to sustain the same state with less resources and better outcome (physical pain) is not as bad as it sounds.

kristianp• 3 years ago

the state has total monopoly over violence.

Gun death stats disagree with you on that one.

dredmorbius• 3 years ago

The monopoly is on the legitimate claim to force, and is based on Max Weber.

David Runciman has an excellent explanation of this in the "Talking Politics" podcast which I recommend unreservedly: <https://play.acast.com/s/history-of-ideas/weberonleadership>

(Specific segment occurs ~15 minutes in.)

akomtu• 3 years ago

By far, the biggest danger to people are tyrannies and wars they wage on their neighbors and their own people. Communusm, nazism, maoism have killed so many that only diseases can rival them. Unjust deaths caused by civilian firearms don't even register in the long list of real dangers. The media turns it upside down, of course.

The many eyed monstrosity that sees everyone and can be seen by no one - the AI powered tyranny - will ride the wave of fear and anxiety to kill the few freedoms we have.

jonathanstrange2• 3 years ago

To me, it is completely obvious that constant drone surveillance of the whole population is a dystopian nightmare, just like implanting brain chips or constant untargeted cell phone surveillance would be. All of these measures need to be commensurate. Reducing violence may be a noble goal but it needs to be weighed against other values such as individual freedom, privacy, and protection from constant government interference.

nathan_compton4• 3 years ago

"Peaceful de-escalation" is a funny way to describe shooting a dude with a drone.

CatWChainsaw• 3 years ago

"It's not an assassination, it's an 'extrajudicial killing'."

"And that makes it so much better?"

"Yeah, that's why they made up a whole new word for it."

5423542342352• 3 years ago

Your examples are all rare edge cases, when the day to day is police using unconstitutional excessive force, including deadly force, with little to no accountability.

The idea that being a police officer is an incredibly dangerous job is just false, and in many cases, the violence is caused by police escalation. Police already have guns, tasers, pepper space, body armor, other police, etc. You are just as likely to be murdered on the job as a convenience store clerk as a cop. Over 600 convenience store workers are murdered on the job per year [1] compared to about 60 per year for police [2], about 5-7 of which are during serving warrants. Convenience store workers are murdered at about 7 per 100k, while police are about 7-8 per 100k [3].

As for giving police access to sweeping facial ID. Whenever the new thing that whittles down the 4th amendment is talked about, it is almost always with a slam dunk case that is also an incredibly serious case. But the average investigation rarely ends in a slam dunk. Allowing police to bypass protections of privacy and checks and balances to their scope of investigation also destroys lives. Semen found inside a person is pretty obvious, but what about just DNA found at a crime scene. If someone is stabbed in a back alley and police just sweep up DNA and run a massive database and tie it to a homeless person without an alibi. It might not matter that the homeless person slept there a week before, in the absence of a better lead, they might push for a conviction. Or just sweeping up all phone pings in the area during the crime. Maybe someone was in the neighborhood but was completely unrelated. In the absence of a better lead, an innocent person could be targeted. Police being able to fish for facial recognition hits is no different.

School shooters? Adding police to patrol schools already has led to police attacking and arresting more students for smaller offenses and ruining more children’s lives, all while failing to stop any school shootings, and it should surprise no one that black and brown kids are the overwhelming victims. “Black students were subjected to more than 80% of the incidents of police violence accounted for in the survey, which analyzed more than 285 incidents over a decade. At least 60% of police assaults on students resulted in serious injury to the students, including broken bones, concussions and hospitalizations. The report also cited 24 cases of sexual assault on students and five student deaths as a result of police force in schools.” Pepper spray drones patrolling schools will be used to target black kids, and when they fail to stop the next 7 school shootings, people will say they really need to be armed with guns to really be able to stop the next school shooting.

[1] https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/cwc/assaults-and-violent-acts-i...

[2] https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-release...

[3] https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/police-2018.htm

[4] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/report-police-schools-ou...

etothepii2• 3 years ago

Is this an audio transcription?

What does: This Act may be referred to as the Drones as First Responders Act.

mean? This level of non-English doesn't strike me as a great idea in an actual law.

michaelmior2• 3 years ago

Instead of referring to the bill as House Bill 3902, the common name that can be used is the "Drones as First Responders Act." This is fairly standard boilerplate.

etothepii2• 3 years ago

Ah! The carriage returns broke my internal parser.

lettergram• 3 years ago

First, I hate Illinois. That said, Illinois is one of the few states that have solid protections against 3rd party recordings (both parties have to consent) and tries to provide some protections around biometrics.

Though... part of me thinks it's about corrupt politicians not wanting to be caught themselves haha. I frankly left the state because it's so corrupt. The pension fund is missing so much money (combined with state debt) that each family would have to pay >$100k to offset the current deficit. PLUS the population is dropping. That doesn't include other corruption, like the co-sponsor of the marijuana legalization bill selling licenses to grow. She was caught and all they did was remove her as a sponsor, that's it. Nothing else.

The one time I saw a glimmer of hope was when everyone voted down an amendment to change the income tax. Left & right politically all agree it's so corrupt and want none of it haha. It's what unifies in the population of the state.

michaelmior2• 3 years ago

Sounded great until I got to this exception. It seems like there's a lot that could easily fall under this especially when the default is often to side with law enforcement.

the law enforcement agency possesses reasonable suspicion that, under particular circumstances, swift action is needed to prevent imminent harm to life or to forestall the imminent escape of a suspect or the destruction of evidence.

iamthirsty• 3 years ago

Good.

activiation• 3 years ago

It should not be limited to police... All government agencies should be subject to the same restrictions... Sheriff, FBI, USPS, IRS, etc...

hospitalJail• 3 years ago

What a world we live in. Major companies are doing facial recognition to improve security and likely lower insurance costs, but the police can't.

The cat is out of the bag on this stuff.

If teenagers can use this technology on Facebook, do we really need to add additional hoops to pretend we have privacy? I'd much rather not put on the show and be aware we are being watched.

wkdneidbwf• 3 years ago

great! now let’s see this same thing at the federal level!

Sparkyte• 3 years ago

Weapons yeah, facial recognition is okay in my books.

But hear me out, that facial recognition would be publicly available data and be opensource.

I believe facial recognition on drones or weapons by any person not law enforcement should be illegal. Just like CCTV footage and stuff it needs to be public or private data for 30 days and then publicly available.

CCTVs deter crime it is a proven fact.

interestica• 3 years ago

Police: "It's not a drone."

Pxtl• 3 years ago

My only concern here is that police in North America already have a mobile units that can pursue and attack people on command with ostensibly less-than-lethal power which have occasionally killed people by accident.

They're called dogs.

I'm having trouble seeing a drone with a taser as worse.

musicale2• 3 years ago

Dogs aren't as good at controlled high-speed flight.

They also can't easily determine the names of everyone in a stadium, or match those names against a database of thousands of suspects.

NoMoreNicksLeft3• 3 years ago

So? When they killed the guy on Dallas, they just jury-rigged up some C4 onto a bomb-defusing robot (haha!) and rolled it into the parking garage.

I'm sure Illinois cops will be able to improvise when they want to pull these stunts.

AHOHA• 3 years ago

They technically can record the video by the drone and then later do the face recognition offline just like any recorded video by personal cams. Also, face recognition on drones isn’t the worse, what’s the flight time, max 40min? Yeah that’s barely a threat, are they also banning the same recognition on other cameras like the ones installed on the roads, urban areas, traffic lights that are working 247? Guess not, it’s just a theater to create the illusion “we care about your privacy and security” or whatever. Ban police dogs, ban the concept of “shooting then asking”, ban hiring the scum of the town and make them go through a very thorough and proper education, not a useless 2 years academy, among other things. But none of that will happen because it’s deeply corrupt.

AngryData• 3 years ago

Armed police drones have a deadly downstream problems too, how will people and/or criminals oppose them, which they certainly will. Some of the most common or best counter options have really bad side effects, the first being people shooting rounds into the air at them which will come down who knows where, and if it becomes a real big problem I foresee small EMP bomb/mortar/grenade devices or powerful jammers being used. A small bit of explosive on the side of a magnet with some loops of copper coil it gets blasted through can deliver a fairly significant EMP blast over a small area which can damage all sorts of devices, especially anything with an antennae, IE every single wireless capable device. And jammers have obvious problems and can be made crazy powerful without much difficulty.

Armed police drones becoming anything near common or expected will kick off a bit of an arms race with criminals. If criminals don't just start copying the exact same thing. Ive seen DIY demonstrations of small drones firing pistols accuratly years ago now, thankfully they haven't taken off, but that might change if the police themselves start using them.

13of40• 3 years ago

Considering people make a hobby of shooting tiny clay disks out of the air with shotguns, and anyone can buy a pump action 12-gauge for less than $500, I don't see how a DJI style drone can be a threat to someone who's prepared themself. (Unless it's already photographed you.)

aauchter• 3 years ago

Well this isnt going to help Chicago gun deaths.

SouthOfHeaven• 3 years ago

Nope. And the loudest anti-cop people don’t care, either.

PM_me_your_math2• 3 years ago

Weapons on drones is a big no-no for me, however, I'm not sold on a total ban of facial recognition on drones. Such technology can be used to catch some really bad actors, especially among the gangs in Chicago.

musicale2• 3 years ago

Why limit the facial recognition ban to drones?

seanmcdirmid5• 3 years ago

What does it mean to not have facial recognition on a drone? Does it mean no apply facial recognition (anywhere, definitely not on the drone) on video feeds obtained from a drone? How does one separate those videos out so they can be processed using ML at all?

A lot of crime can be tracked more easily if we know who is doing it, like shoplifting. It might not be practical to arrest every shoplifter, but facial recognition lets us keep track of how often someone is shoplifting, and maybe it makes sense to arrest someone who has stolen more than N dollars of stuff. Likewise for petty crime on the streets.

robbywashere_• 3 years ago

Utopia is upon us

Illinois prohibits weapons, facial recognition on police drones

Related Stories