Just on the day when the French Assemblée Nationale kind of accidentally introduced some kind of “cultural flatrate” (which is obviously opposed to the government’s intent) the Independent has learnt that the British government is demonstrating boldly that digital technology need not be used to free either bits and bytes, or even people.
Britain is to become the first country in the world where the movements of all vehicles on the roads are recorded. A new national surveillance system will hold the records for at least two years. … Every time you make a car journey already, you’ll be on CCTV somewhere. The difference is that, in future, the car’s index plates will be read as well,” said Frank Whiteley, Chief Constable of Hertfordshire and chairman of the Acpo steering committee on automatic number plate recognition (ANPR).”
When will the responsible people realise that we are likely to have already passed the point where freedom is enhanced and protected by security measures. When I was at the LSE, I attended a seminar held by David Held called “rethinking the modern polity”. We started by thinking about Hobbes. But we did not think we’d end up there again.
So? Don’t leave the basement, like me. What’s “out there” anyway?
Then of course, the above would imply that virtually all my interaction with other people would already be registered.
Very well, point taken.
Well it does see to be the sort of system where the vast majority of innocent law abiding citizens are actively controlled, but where the intelligent would-be criminal can simply sidestep (either by using public transport and wearing a beard, or by switching the plates).
Did you notice how Symantec now have an issue whereby their software facilitates hackers entry to your PC, and, oh yes, there was the little problem Sony had with their copyright protection for CDs. Hmmmmmmm.
Isn´t this concern for freedom overblown? This is more a matter of how much trust you have in the system. Afterall, the congestion charge has been working in London for awhile now with this sort of technology. Technology is no longer the main issue. The question you should be asking is how secure the data is and what sort of privacy protection/legislation is/will be in place when it is implemented.
In fact, many countries are moving towards far more extensive systems for roadvehicle registration instead of tollways, vignets or a general roadtax. We´ll be seeing this a lot more in the future.
N.B.
The German LKW-MAUT system, which works with an actual milage tax of 0,12 euro/km, keeps track of LKW´s actual location on the German Autobahn via an extensive system. The system works, and I wouldn´t be surprised if it´s introduced for PKW´s as well.
CapTVK,
I wouldn’t care if I were absolutely sure that the government can’t turn to a soft version of despotism. What kind of people are politicians in today’s Europe? Give them a tool and they abuse it. Sooner or later.
“Isn´t this concern for freedom overblown?”
Ask your ancestors.
CapTVK,
a) technology is still an issue. Most people with a background in recognition technology will be hard pressed not to acknowledge that their system’s error rates are impressively high. This is true for biometrics as it is for any kind of recognition system rolled out large scale.
>The question you should be asking is how secure >the data is and what sort of privacy >protection/legislation is/will be in place when >it is implemented.
Well, I don’t see the need to do it, for reasons I thought obvious (and which Edward laid out very well above). However, if introduced, it seems the British system doesn’t address the points you mention in a satisfactorily addressed.
>In fact, many countries are moving towards far >more extensive systems for roadvehicle >registration instead of tollways, vignets or a >general roadtax. We´ll be seeing this a lot >more in the future.
Seriously, more exact charges for road usage and internalisation of external costs are – except for a few pressing cases like London – not really the point of concern. They are euphemisms for an all too common interest in data collection.
And of course, I am concerned about the German road toll system as well. There have already been attemps (and one instance where it has happened) to use the data for investigative purposes.
Let’s hope (I’m rather sure) the German Constitutional court will stop such events if Berlin should actually attempt to do so.
Tobias,
I think the discussion a couple of weeks ago was about the USE of the Maut data for criminal investigations not COLLECTION. The data is collected anyway (otherwise they have no means of catching cheaters) the question is whether it is actually used. Or in this respect, being transferred to the state, because the Toll Collect company (the one that manages the system) is a private company.