[HN Gopher] New German government calls for European ban on biom...
___________________________________________________________________
New German government calls for European ban on biometric mass
surveillance
Author : giuliomagnifico
Score : 456 points
Date : 2021-11-25 15:36 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (reclaimyourface.eu)
(TXT) w3m dump (reclaimyourface.eu)
| m0zg wrote:
| There will 100% be generous carveouts for the government and the
| security state by the time this is signed. Bet money on it. I'm
| sure it'll be "for the children" or "against terrorism" or
| "against COVID" or whatever, but the capability will remain. No
| government has ever willingly relinquished a capability like
| this.
| toss1 wrote:
| Ha! I read "biometric mass surveillance" as some new remote
| sensing method to determine how much people weigh.
|
| The actual article makes more sense & is a good thing.
| ramsundhar20 wrote:
| Biometric surveillance should get stopped. People deserve their
| privacy. EU should focus on greater human interests.
| 1cvmask wrote:
| Not a lawyer here but it seems that there are exceptions carved
| out:
|
| In particular, we ask the Commission to prohibit, in law and in
| practice, indiscriminate or arbitrarily-targeted uses of
| biometrics which can lead to unlawful mass surveillance.
|
| -
|
| So long as it is discriminate and non-arbitrary that can be ok
| then?
|
| We have seen so many legal justifications and equivocations to
| laws from the surveillance state that I now assume legal counsel
| will always find a way to break the prima facie law.
|
| German intelligence broke many German laws with the NSA, while
| Merkel virtue signaled and decried the NSA (comparing them to the
| Stasi) and Obama spying on her.
|
| https://www.dw.com/en/edward-snowden-germany-a-primary-examp...
|
| https://www.dw.com/en/danish-secret-service-helped-us-spy-on...
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/17/merkel-compare...
| mschuster91 wrote:
| To quote the _original_ from the Koalitionsvertrag
| (https://www.tagesschau.de/koalitionsvertrag-147.pdf):
|
| > Biometrische Erkennung im offentlichen Raum sowie
| automatisierte staatliche Scoring Systeme durch KI sind
| europarechtlich auszuschliessen (page 19)
|
| Translated: Biometric recognition in public spaces as well as
| AI-based, automated scoring systems ran by governments are to
| be prohibited by European law.
|
| > Flachendeckende Videouberwachung und den Einsatz von
| biometrischer Erfassung zu Uberwachungszwecken lehnen wir ab
|
| Translated: We refuse widespread video surveillance as well as
| usage of biometric recognition for surveillance purposes.
|
| To summarize: Using biometrics or other technology for
| surveillance, particularly any attempt to recreate China's
| Social Credit Score, is banned. The exception in the English
| text is to allow biometric measures for identification (e.g.
| passports) and access control.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| > _Biometric recognition in public spaces ... are to be
| prohibited by European law._
|
| That's ok but an exception for law enforcement and national
| security would be useful.
|
| This technology is a tool, like all technologies, and as such
| it may be used positively or negatively.
|
| For instance, here in the UK we have automatic plate
| recognition cameras that are used to track uninsured or
| wanted cars. In the same spirit it might be useful to have
| similar cameras operated by the police to match people with a
| database of wanted or missing people (with only matches
| stored and reported for further investigation). Now this may
| not not work very well yet, there may be caveats and
| procedures to develop, etc but IMHO this means we should work
| on it and see if it can become useful rather than killing it
| off completely so early by having a blanket ban.
|
| In any case, individual member states can draw their own laws
| on this.
|
| On a side note, the wording in English might give the
| impression that the German government decides EU law...
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > That's ok but an exception for law enforcement and
| national security would be useful.
|
| Jesus hell no. Law enforcement already has too many
| permissions, and you can bet that there are more than
| enough people who would like the police to put iris
| scanners, gait monitors and other crap on each train
| station and public square. Minority Report and Little
| Brother should be warning enough, I feel no desire to see
| science fiction becoming reality.
|
| > but IMHO this means we should work on it and see if it
| can become useful rather than killing it off completely so
| early by having a blanket ban.
|
| We need a blanket ban because when you grant the government
| a single digit of your hand, tomorrow it has your whole arm
| in a vice. "War on terror!" "War on drugs!", "war on
| prostitution!", "protect our children from kidnapping!!!" -
| the list of stuff that people _will_ bring up once the
| technology is in place is endless, and there are enough
| voters convinceable with fear mongering that the
| authoritarians will get what they want.
|
| > In any case, individual member states can draw their own
| laws on this.
|
| Blanket bans and mandatory requirements cannot be
| overridden, which is part of why many politicians from all
| EU countries choose the "Brussels backdoor" to pass shit
| they would get kicked out of office for at home, and when
| local voters rightfully complain, they just say "complain
| in Brussel, not my fault, we are just doing the whims of
| the EU".
|
| (Side note: this despicable behavior and complicit/ignorant
| media are a major reason for public trust in the EU
| eroding!)
|
| > On a side note, the wording in English might give the
| impression that the German government decides EU law...
|
| Let's be real: Germany, France, Italy and Spain are the
| dominant powers in the European Union. As long as only the
| Commission has the right to initiate the passing of laws,
| most initiatives will come out of these "big four"
| countries, and there will not be any initiatives where it
| isn't clear from the beginning that they have a high
| likelihood of passing.
| shlurpy wrote:
| A technology that is especially easy to use very negatively
| and relies on a constant maintenence of good moral virtue
| in government or law enforcement is a dangerously unstable
| risk. Its like how actively cooled nuclear reactors are
| just a technology, but its a far better idea to build them
| such that if power is lost even for a moment you don't
| experience a dangerous meltdown.
| simiones wrote:
| I would say that, on the contrary, police and secret
| services are the institutions it's _most_ important to keep
| this out of the hands of.
|
| While private companies are using this data in ways that
| cause harm quite indirectly (influence, consumerism -
| societal evils to be sure, but no immediate threat to your
| life), police and the SS are most likely to cause very
| active harm with such technologies.
| gmueckl wrote:
| Exceptions for law enforcement have proven to be a _very_
| slippery slope in the past. Police is constantly trying to
| erode restrictions around tools that are only available for
| serious crimes and unfortunately also has a record of
| successfully circumventing any access checks for
| surveillance tools that have been put in place by
| lawmakers. There is constant and incessant lobbying from
| these circles to get more surveillance in place. But, when
| pressed, no one can point to cases where this actually
| helped.
|
| The only realistic way to counter this is to say no to
| surveillance technology from the start.
| throwawaysea wrote:
| You seem to be vaguely gesturing at some kind of abuse
| but have provided no evidence. Even if a tool is abused
| in isolated incidents, it can be useful to society
| overall.
|
| > But, when pressed, no one can point to cases where this
| actually helped.
|
| This seems like an early dismissal. It is obvious how
| facial recognition can help locate suspects for some
| crime more easily than a police officer hoping to
| randomly find the suspect while driving around.
|
| > The only realistic way to counter this
|
| Counter what exactly? This just feels like FUD.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| I think that if the people see the government and
| especially the police as the enemy then society has a
| bigger problem than surveillance technology.
|
| Of course, there should be checks, controls, limitations
| placed upon those institutions, and transparency in their
| workings. But the police is here to protect and serve the
| community, at least it should be, not to oppress it. I've
| noticed that this is a difference in the way the police
| is often seen in Europe vs. in the UK for instance.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > But the police is here to protect and serve the
| community, at least it should be, not to oppress it.
|
| The key question when the phrase "protect and serve the
| community" comes up is "which community?" and the answer
| is: it primarily serves the interest of the rich and
| powerful. If you are poor, not in the majority ethnic or
| in any other way not "mainstream", you have shit times
| ahead of you. No matter the country, the only difference
| between a cop in the US and a cop in the UK is better
| training and less reliance on guns.
|
| Homeless, being a person of color, being LGBT, protesting
| the government (especially from the left wing) - all
| common risk factors for adverse interactions with police.
| If you never have had a negative interaction with police,
| ask yourself why and prepare for an answer you likely
| would not have liked to hear.
| trasz wrote:
| >the only difference between a cop in the US and a cop in
| the UK is better training and less reliance on guns
|
| Ah, so that's why American cops routinely murder random
| people and go unpunished - it's just the lack of
| training!
|
| (The reality is that there's a fundamental difference in
| that in Europe police is just another government branch
| that's helping people, like firefighters and doctors;
| normal people don't need to fear them and avoid any
| unnecessary interactions, which seems to be the case in
| the US.)
| wolframhempel wrote:
| I'm generally positively surprised by the coalition-agenda
| (Koalitionsvertrag) that was presented by the upcoming German
| government yesterday. Fairly centrist policies and a focus on
| modernization. There's a separate question about how much of it
| will actually be implemented, but the uncommon mix of three
| fairly different parties seems to have created a sensible
| equilibrium.
| wirrbel wrote:
| All parties have strong conservative wings.
|
| There is some potential for reform-pushing within the Greens
| and FDP, and I expect we won't see as much of that in the
| agreement but things will pop up once the chancellor has been
| elected.
| throwawaysea wrote:
| I don't get why people want to ban facial recognition. There
| shouldn't be an expectation of privacy in public spaces. And
| facial recognition is simply making a manual task police need to
| do a lot cheaper, helping them identify suspects who break the
| law. At least in the US, west coast cities definitely need
| greater surveillance of public spaces, with facial recognition
| (and other such tech), if they want to deal with the contagion of
| large raids on stores which began in SF and now has spread to LA.
| I feel like we can use this tech with some very simple controls
| like requiring reasonable suspicion of a crime, and keeping a
| human in the loop to verify matches, and make the best of this
| technology to help society. The group processing facial
| recognition matches can even be separate from the police force,
| essentially providing tips to police dispatch when they find a
| likely match.
| mekal wrote:
| "There shouldn't be an expectation of privacy in public
| spaces." Perhaps not to some degree, but facial recognition
| takes it up a notch. And ultimately what we should or shouldn't
| expect is up to us right?
|
| Suppose someone found a way to passively and remotely read
| people's minds. And as a result you can't go anywhere in public
| unless you were OK with your thoughts being captured and
| recorded. You could see how that would suck right? And the
| potential for abuse? Might be great for the police I suppose,
| and would probably lower the crime rate. But would you want to
| live like that? Facial recognition isn't that extreme of
| course, but they are both in the privacy ball park, at least in
| my opinion. So maybe its just a matter of degree...like what
| you're willing to put up with / feel comfortable with.
| charcircuit wrote:
| It wouldn't suck. Nothing would change for you. The impact to
| the average person's life would be 0.
| shapefrog wrote:
| > Suppose someone found a way to passively and remotely read
| people's minds
|
| Can a trained chimp do that now? No.
|
| Can a trained chimp recognise a face. Yes.
|
| Computer facial recognition is simply digitising human
| workflow, like converting a speech to text. I assume people
| also have a similar problem with electronic transcription or
| 'word recognition technology'.
|
| Scanning peoples brains and reading their thoughts is literal
| mind reading science fiction.
| throwaway55421 wrote:
| Yet scanning a QR code which uniquely identifies an individual to
| get into any venue is totally fine because we didn't update the
| source code yet and so it's not phoning home this week.
|
| Well, if the source (of the scanner) is even legit, since the app
| stores provide no way to verify that anyway.
| hammock wrote:
| The new German government is also anti-lockdown and presumably
| passport (at least moreso than Merkel). One of the first things
| he did was scrap Merkel's plans for a new two-week countrywide
| lockdown.
|
| It's also worth pointing out that Germany DOES recognize
| natural immunity and allows this to serve in place of a jab.
| Haven't seen that reported in US news but you can find it in
| European papers.
| [deleted]
| tremon wrote:
| _One of the first things he did was scrap Merkel 's plans for
| a new two-week countrywide lockdown._
|
| That lockdown was not a completely unfounded suggestion
| though, given that both the number of infected and the number
| of new cases/day are twice as high as during last year's peak
| [1] -- and last year's peak was around Christmas, not in
| November.
|
| [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/germany
| /#g...
| brummm wrote:
| The majority are unvaccinated people. It's really their own
| god damn fault for not getting vaccinated. At the most
| there should be a lockdown for unvaccinated people.
| pelasaco wrote:
| I'm vaccinated and I'm German. Your suggestion ignores
| that vaccinated people are part of the transmission chain
| exactly as the non-vaccinated. We believed that
| vaccinated wouldn't transmit it, but they do. Kids too.
| If you are vaccinated and visit your grandma, you are
| putting her in risk. Testing everyone and quarantining
| the positives still our best bet to avoid social conflict
| while trying to fight this pandemic.
|
| References:
|
| https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02689-y
|
| https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/innenpolitik/impfdurchbr
| uec... (german)
| google234123 wrote:
| WIth this attitude you will never visit your grandma
| again. The classic influenza lineage has been around
| since 1918.
| ostenning wrote:
| QR codes aren't effective at all as a surveillance mechanism.
| Why the hell does the government need to monitor which venues
| you visit based on QR code check-ins? They literally just ask
| Apple, Google, or any other big tech company about your phones
| geolocation and IP log history to monitor your whereabouts.
|
| Most people with accounts to these platforms have credit-cards,
| payment history and communication with others. There is nothing
| particularly special about vaccination QR codes being more
| unique than any of the other multitudes of data you already
| provide, willingly, to these tech corps.
| emteycz wrote:
| Asking Google or Apple means asking a foreign corporation,
| likely through legal means and definitely targeted to
| individuals, not population-wide.
|
| Checking logs of a state-run server is way easier.
| mod50ack wrote:
| The QR verification app doesn't ping back to a server,
| though. You can literally check. It's open source.
| emteycz wrote:
| Not true. I just spent half an hour googling and
| otherwise looking for the source code, and it's not
| published anywhere (Czech version - apps named "cTecka"
| and "Tecka").
| soco wrote:
| Sorry for the reality check: said states make requests _all
| the time_ to Google and Apple and also receive the
| requested data, and we have apparently no issue with this.
| Instead we use an imaginary feature no scanner outside
| China has (phoning home) and complain about _that_.
| emteycz wrote:
| That's alright - because that request goes through
| courts. When the state owns the server being requested,
| they just read the logs _without having to consult a
| judge_.
| soco wrote:
| Complaining about straw-man arguments is not bringing much. The
| facts are: the scanners code is opensource and does not phone
| home. The rest is fantasy - a valid ethical discussion of
| course, and it's up to us to discuss it properly (that is,
| keeping in touch with reality).
| nnamtr wrote:
| A restaurant or company could use its own scanner app to save
| the data, but I assume this would be illegal
| soco wrote:
| Technically they could - if they had the skills (a
| restaurant with programmer staff?), had a the reason
| (risking to alienate the customers?) and had the guts to go
| against GDPR (somebody _will_ spill the beans). So...
| chriswarbo wrote:
| You can choose whether or not to show a QR code, or even
| disclose whether you have one, and to whom.
|
| Mass surveillance is imposed and can't be opted-out from
| (unless you have an invisibility device, in the case of
| widespread cameras).
|
| QR codes can also be discarded, or new ones issued. Biometrics
| (e.g. face structure) cannot be replaced once "compromised". I
| use quotes for the latter, since biometrics are never secret in
| the first place (e.g. if we could keep our faces, fingerprints,
| DNA, etc. secret then they'd be useless in criminal
| investigations!).
| Dma54rhs wrote:
| Who cares about new qr code when you scan and receive the
| same PI every time? You can scan a new code but keep
| recording.
| emteycz wrote:
| I am required to show a QR code to eat.
| simion314 wrote:
| Can't you just show the paper with the proof of
| vaccination? Like I might not have a smartphone but I have
| the paper and ID card in my wallet.
| emteycz wrote:
| And the paper has a QR code and the checking application
| makes a request to a state-run server with its data
| (including owner ID).
| sc11 wrote:
| That's incorrect, the verification happens fully locally.
| The check app occasionally has to update trusted
| certificates but otherwise it runs locally. No personal
| data is sent to any kind of server.
| simion314 wrote:
| It depends on location, I doubt some shop or restaurant
| worker will bother to scan your paper and upload it to
| the government. QR code scanning should work without
| Internet I bet if you (the group that thinks it is a
| conspiracy not you personally) could just disassemble the
| Android app and see exactly what it sends and to who.
| blargpls wrote:
| In Germany you can also just show the Europaischer
| Impfausweis (official yellow booklet containing all your
| vaccinations) that doesn't contain any QR codes.
| amaccuish wrote:
| Not in Berlin. Only the digital version is allowed for
| entry to those places.
|
| Source: https://www.rbb24.de/panorama/thema/corona/beitra
| ege/2021/09...
| cyxxon wrote:
| ...to eat at a restaurant. You can shop at a supermarket
| and eat at home. The thing is that yes, during the pandemic
| (and only then) for reasons of public health and safety,
| society has deemed this small violation of privacy
| necessary.
| Dma54rhs wrote:
| Nothing will change with biometric and other mass surveillance
| either - the temporary feeling of security will always put
| these things first.
| thepangolino wrote:
| The lack of pushback against that practice literally blew my
| mind. The potential for abuse is literally limitless.
|
| I've even personally seen the treatment I've received the
| moment my name popped up on their screen after getting scanned.
| (My fave doesn't show it but I'm of heavy ethnic background)
| throemdiwo wrote:
| Bless you. Of course, such things can only be muttered from
| throw away accounts.
| iso1631 wrote:
| It's the automation that worries me. I'm not too concerned about
| proper companies using CCTV to record, as it's well managed and
| gets deleted unseen, unless something happens. I'm not too
| concerned about the police pulling those CCTV pictures to
| investigate a crime either.
|
| Things like ring doorbells on the other hand should be cracked
| down - the number of times I see people in the UK posting
| pictures of public areas on facebook is shocking, but if they're
| just sat there, being deleted unless pulled for a proper reason,
| that's fine too.
|
| What really does concern me is when things like image recognition
| come into the picture. A corporation can't montior me by paying
| someone to sift through CCTV pictures. They can montior me by
| using automation to process everything though.
|
| This is a good thing, how successful it is remains to be seen.
| minimilian wrote:
| > I'm not too concerned about proper companies using CCTV to
| record, as it's well managed and gets deleted unseen, unless
| something happens. I'm not too concerned about the police
| pulling those CCTV pictures to investigate a crime either.
|
| Question: Wouldn't it be reasonable to have a law that
| recordings of public areas for the sake of investigation of
| serious crime be immediately encrypted such that they could
| only be decrypted by a court order? (Such a law might be
| enforced by random inspections and huge fines.)
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Probably not reasonable. You will get into problems deciding
| whose keys to use, key distribution, people not being able to
| use their equipment correctly...
|
| But banning devices from automatically posting everything to
| the manufacturer's computers without any user intervention is
| easy, and quite probably enough for the near future.
| minimilian wrote:
| > You will get into problems deciding whose keys to use
|
| How about a secret-sharing scheme that requires keys from a
| certain number of judges?
| rodgerd wrote:
| It would be interesting to send these things to whatever the
| equivalent to NZ's office of the privacy comissioner is, for
| example, which would probably lead to sound oversight (until
| pressure to replace privacy-focused staff with compliant ones
| eventually kicked in).
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| > Things like ring doorbells on the other hand should be
| cracked down - the number of times I see people in the UK
| posting pictures of public areas on facebook is shocking.
|
| While I do share your concern, the current rule of thumb - at
| least in the USA - is that privacy is not expected in public
| spaces. I can see that since, by definition, that's what makes
| public public.
| nikonyrh wrote:
| My understanding is that in Finland only the Government (or
| an other democratic entity such as the Municipality or the
| City) can execute surveillance on a public space. For example
| the bike parking area next to my office is deemed a public
| space, the office building next to it cannot point its
| security cameras to that direction. Which is a shame since
| there is a lot of bike theft and vandalism, but the city
| doesn't want to install their own cameras.
|
| People are allowed to take photos and videos on a public
| area, but aren't allowed to leave a recording device there.
| simiones wrote:
| Sure, but perhaps this could be seen to come under the
| purview of stalking legislation, or a similar principle?
| tjoff wrote:
| Just because you can't expect privacy doesn't mean you can
| exploit it and record everything.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| If you can site a law / legal decision that would help.
| shapefrog wrote:
| Will you also be requiring people to avert their eyes when
| you are nearby such that they dont mistakenly observe you?
| rodgerd wrote:
| Yes, and it shows how US[1] interpretations of the
| constitution and general lawmaking hasn't really evolved.
| It's one thing to say, "you're in public, deal with it" when
| (say) taking a photo of me and publishing it is likely to be
| time-consuming and local and scope; it is another to be able
| to follow me all day, publish globally, and for essentially
| zero cost.
|
| [1] The US is hardly alone in this - they just happen to be
| the point here.
| shlurpy wrote:
| There is a difference between incidentally public (someone
| can see you, snap a picture, but only on occasion) and
| surveilence public (someone can track your location and
| activity continously in public). If someone does the latter,
| and I know about it, I can still sue them for harassment, and
| maybe get a restraining order. Can I get a restraining order
| against Nest or similar?
|
| I understand that this might not be the law, but I'm
| interested in if it should be.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Again, I agree and empathize.
|
| But the counter argument would be "Harassed by a doorbell,
| how so?" and "I have a right to protect my property and my
| family. My camera allows this to happen."
|
| Unless the legal definition of "in public" changes, the
| surveillance will continue.
| iso1631 wrote:
| In the UK we have guidance about how to use CCTV to
| protect your property and family
|
| https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/domestic-cctv-
| usi...
|
| For example
|
| "you should make sure that the information recorded is
| used only for the purpose for which your system was
| installed (for example it will not be appropriate to
| share any recordings on social media sites)"
|
| This is of course routinely ignored and unenforced
| kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
| > used only for the purpose for which your system was
| installed
|
| So install it for the purpose of sharing on social media.
| Problem solved!
|
| (I'm only half joking)
| robbedpeter wrote:
| I most often see Nest recordings posted to local
| community groups warning against and seeing to track down
| porch pirates. I recently saw extensive footage of young
| people breaking into a house to have a party while the
| owner was out. All of their parents were notified and
| they'll be doing community service.
|
| I think if you're in public, you should assume you're
| going to be recorded. I don't think it _should_ be this
| way, but it is.
|
| I think the inflection point between surveillance and
| home security is "cloud." The footage should not be
| accessible to third parties without a warrant, and it
| should be under the individual's control. Questions of
| life, limb, and liberty should not be offloaded to
| unelected, self-interested, profit seeking corporations
| like Amazon and Google.
| jacquesm wrote:
| The other matter of concern is how many of these bits of data
| end up on servers outside of the EU, if you want something done
| about it you are essentially powerless.
| gunapologist99 wrote:
| At the end of the day, does it even really matter _where_ the
| data is stored?
|
| It shouldn't be recorded in the first place.
| disabled wrote:
| Not always true. It depends on the circumstances.
|
| That being said, I will never get a Ring doorbell or
| something similar. I also believe that the tech companies
| should not be allowed to hoard data about people's private
| or public lives at all.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| If a law says a company doing buisness in EU may not track
| users with face recognition, then you surely could charge
| them, if they merely outsource to outside of the EU as they
| are still the ones ordering the illegal surveillance.
| tobylane wrote:
| I believe you can complain to your local data commissioner,
| eg https://ico.org.uk. They should cover this and the right
| to have an automated decision reviewed manually.
| noja wrote:
| .uk is not European
| dbetteridge wrote:
| Not the EU*
|
| Unless I'm mistaken the UK hasn't drifted off and become
| and independent island chain separate from Europe
| shlurpy wrote:
| European means different things in different contexts.
| Sometimes it is used as the adjective form of EU member
| state. Discussion of an aarticle in which Germany is
| calling for a Eurpean ban is such a context, since that
| is the form the title is using.
| disabled wrote:
| People outside the EU do not realize this: "Not European"
| is used colloquially by people in the European Union to
| refer to EU countries, institutions, etc.
| mrweasel wrote:
| Many countries/languages use versions of "The US" and USA
| to avoid confusing the US with America. So it's only
| reasonable that we make the distinction for Europe and
| the EU.
|
| The problem is the there's no specific term for the
| people living in either the US or the EU, so we "wrongly"
| use Americans and European.
| disabled wrote:
| European Union citizens and United States citizens are an
| extremely heterogeneous group of people, which is the
| situation at hand. Besides being a citizen, there is
| truly no shared identity in this situation.
|
| Note: I say this as both a US|EU citizen.
| zarzavat wrote:
| In my experience it's mostly people outside of Europe who
| confuse the EU with Europe, whereas Europeans are less
| likely to make that error.
| jacquesm wrote:
| > Unless I'm mistaken the UK hasn't drifted off and
| become and independent island chain separate from Europe
|
| Some would argue that's exactly what happened but your
| point is valid, EU != 'Europe the continent'. The problem
| is that such imprecise usage is rampant.
| emteycz wrote:
| At least it's not up for grabs by the EU as easily there
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Maybe I missed it, but to what level is BMS happening already?
| Mind you, I understand the issue / problem. What I'm trying to
| gauge is the likelihood of a ban based on how embedded the
| behaviour is already.
| nkmnz wrote:
| Thanks to FDP and Green Party --- you cannot trust Social
| Democrats on such issues at all!
| george_kaplan wrote:
| Neither can you trust the FDP. When they became part of the
| governing coalition in the state of NRW they immediately passed
| a bill for more video surveillance and abolished the
| requirement for law enforcement to wear visible name labels or
| badge numbers.
| nkmnz wrote:
| ...the same kind of bitter pill the Green Party has to take
| whenever they are a minority partner in a State Government.
| Nothing new for both parties that they need to compromise -
| now, it's new that they can act together on a lot of issues
| against a relatively smaller and potentially very weak third
| party. I know from first hand experience how deeply rooted
| the ,,law and order" thought is within the Social Democratic
| Party, since I've been running for office against one of
| their hard liners in 2013. Hint: it's been the one caught
| buying crystal meth a couple of months later :)
| quakeguy wrote:
| Michael Hartmann?
| siruncledrew wrote:
| It's not just governments across Europe, but this petition also
| calls for the ban of companies doing it too.
|
| I wonder how the "watchdog" piece of this would work, practically
| speaking, since nowadays almost anywhere with a decent camera can
| implement some kind of facial recognition or tracking, and
| cameras are ubiquitous.
|
| Maybe places will find a workaround like just export the video to
| a different geographic zone datacenter to analyze it.
|
| I don't see all governments or businesses agreeing to this
| because: 1. They wouldn't want to, 2. It would be hard to prevent
| if the ways to do it still exist, 3. The "big enough" places will
| just do it anyway in secret.
| isodev wrote:
| In most EU countries you can't just record people in public
| without their opt-in consent (Nope, not even taking pictures).
| Shipping the footage to another location is also not allowed
| unless you get informed consent exactly who and why will have
| access to your details.
| skummetmaelk wrote:
| > Maybe places will find a workaround like just export the
| video to a different geographic zone datacenter to analyze it.
|
| Which is also illegal.
| moffkalast wrote:
| Believe it or not, straight to jail.
| cyberpunk wrote:
| Meanwhile from 2022 onwards all entry to the EU from non-eu
| citizens will require Fingerprints and Facial scans to be saved
| [0].
|
| One rule for us, one for the rest, it seems.
|
| (For the record, I am absolutely against this, having recently
| lost my EU citizenship).
|
| 0: https://ees.secunet.com/en/about-entry-exit-system/
| schleck8 wrote:
| It's good meassure to prevent abuse of immigration
| opportunities. It's not possible for everything to be ideal,
| this is an acceptable compromise for most.
| bserge wrote:
| Copying the other guys, as always. The US has been collecting
| fingerprints for decades, and many other countries do it, too.
| streamofdigits wrote:
| I just hope that the new balance of power in Germany will
| energize Europe to take concrete next steps towards an altenative
| way of organizing digital life.
| dane-pgp wrote:
| Another good opportunity for improving digital life in Europe
| is with the proposed Digital Markets Act[0], which looks set to
| mandate that phone OSes allow side-loading, and require social
| media & messaging services to interoperate with competitors.
|
| [0] https://www.euractiv.com/section/digital/news/eu-
| parliaments...
| 71a54xd wrote:
| I'm generally confused as to how the EU seemingly gets things
| right when it comes to privacy like banning biometric
| surveillance yet seems completely hell bent on creating a
| surveillance state in other areas (like banning encryption
| outright [0] or creating outsized penalties for wrong-speak [1]).
|
| Of course the US just builds things like this for political gain
| and taxation.
|
| 0 - https://mailbox.org/en/post/it-companies-warn-eu-plans-to-
| ba... 1 -
| https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/qanda_...
| shlurpy wrote:
| Lots of different interests hashing it out in an at least
| somewhat functioning democracy are going to experience somewhat
| schizophrenic behavior.
| zajio1am wrote:
| And also forcing biometric data in ID cards:
|
| https://blog.hidglobal.com/2021/09/european-union-already-ro...
| pjerem wrote:
| What's wrong with the biometric data as long as it's only
| inside the card and not stored elsewhere ?
|
| The only thing you can do is to be able to prove (or not)
| that it's your ID.
|
| Or am I missing something ?
| dane-pgp wrote:
| How did the data get into the card? And how do you know it
| isn't stored elsewhere? It wouldn't be the first time a
| government failed to admit exactly what information it was
| keeping about its citizens, and how it was using it against
| their interests:
|
| https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/bulk-personal-datasets-how-
| mi5-gch...
| throwaway473825 wrote:
| The biometric data (fingerprints and facial images) are
| stored on a chip in the card. This is a pragmatic way of
| increasing security without enabling mass surveillance.
| newtoy wrote:
| Where this all becomes problematic is either government or
| corporate entities using it to manipulate and punish individuals
| for being individuals but not harmful to others. Controlling
| whether you can even get water food and shelter and imprisonment
| for not promoting or for demoting their own world view.
| stareblinkstare wrote:
| >Since 2020, the Reclaim Your Face coalition has actively put
| pressure on decision-makers by uncovering surveillance,
| publishing research reports, and mobilising people for a society
| free from harmful technologies such as facial recognition _in
| publicly-accessible spaces_.
|
| Emphasis mine. This won't do much, and all the surveillance data
| will be shipped to China anyway. You're already in their database
| somewhere and they know more about you than the rest of the West
| combined.
| jchmrt wrote:
| I think the defeatist stance of 'it will go to China anyways is
| quite harmful. We should at least try to legislate useful
| things and enforce them for the common good. Besides, if
| companies want to avoid the legislation, sending the data to
| China will not do them much good: what they are doing will be
| just as illegal. And presumably companies recording video on EU
| soil can be regulated from the EU.
| macawfish wrote:
| How can they stop 5G?
| dane-pgp wrote:
| The parent comment may look like a baseless conspiracy theory,
| but it is worth considering the unintended consequences for
| privacy of bombarding public areas with more radio data. For
| example:
|
| > Researchers in the US have used WiFi signals to detect the
| gait of people through walls and match it to video footage in
| order to identify individuals.
|
| https://www.theengineer.co.uk/wifi-walls-walkers-gait/
| binarysneaker wrote:
| I guess now that the UK is no longer part of the EU, this has a
| higher probability of happening.
| newtoy wrote:
| Biometric mass surveillance is a problem because bad actors in
| government and corporations have and will use it to the
| individual's detriment. People are prevented or made to endure
| hardship at acquiring food, water, shelter and clothing,
| imprisoned and punished, for nothing more than not being part of
| the party holding power.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-11-25 23:00 UTC)