I’d like to follow up on yesterday’s story. It’s a?story of how surveillance was used, and so was Sean Penn (unwillingly) to catch drug lord El Chapo. Don’t think you have to be a drug cartel leader to be followed. Even local police departments are calculating your threat score.
In Fresno, California, local law enforcement is using Beware software to calculate how dangerous people like you and me are. They comprise criminal records, commercial databases, Internet searches, hard drives, even a person’s social media posts. Law enforcement can do this as easy as lenders can track your credit score to determine a loan application. For example, 911 was called on a violent ex-boyfriend threatening his ex-girl. Beware software ran a threat score. His score came up bright red: the most dangerous. Police say such software can prevent mass shootings and terrorist attacks and find wanted suspects. But privacy rights advocates and civil libertarians say this is a violation of the Constitution. They’re calling for laws to be in place to protect the public. According to a representative from privacy and digital rights organization?Electronic Frontier Foundation, Beware software and other technologies like it have been in the works since 9/11. The rep said at first, only the military was to use this technology, now it has trickled down to local police departments.
Even today, sime members of the law enforcement community point to tragedies like Paris and San Bernadino for the need of Beware software, and other surveillance tools needed. Would it prevent such terror attacks? I don’t know. But I do know this is a debate that needs to be continued. My concern is this: How much longer before they turn these tools on law-abiding citizens? Don’t think they won’t? I have it by good authority Black Lives Matters protesters are already being spied on. American Revolutionary Benjamin Franklin said it best, “Anyone willing to give up liberty for security deserve neither liberty nor security.” ?Is anybody listening?