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The Freedom of the Press Foundation has called on professional camera makers to implement encryption in cameras to prevent governments from easily searching and seizing the contents:
An open letter written by the Freedom of the Press Foundation and signed by over 150 filmmakers and photojournalists calls on professional camera makers such as Nikon, Canon, Olympus, and Fuji to enable encryption to protect confidential videos from seizure by oppressive governments or criminals. The Freedom of the Press Foundation is a non-profit organization that has several noteworthy members, such as "Pentagon Papers" Daniel Ellsberg, Edward Snowden, and EFF's co-founder John Perry Barlow, on its board of directors.
[...] Filmmakers and photojournalists that film documentaries or shoot photos of abuses committed by governments or terrorists in dangerous parts of the world are constantly under threat of having their videos and photos seized and destroyed. The danger is even bigger when these bad actors can see what's on the cameras--it's not just the documentation of abuses that is exposed, but also the confidential sources that may have wanted to keep their identities hidden. Encryption would ensure those who seize their cameras couldn't see the contents of the cameras, nor the journalists' sources.
This won't necessarily ensure that the information collected by journalists is disseminated, since border agents and law enforcement officers can just destroy encrypted equipment. For that, cloud storage or live streaming features are needed, as well as reliable access to the Internet even during times of political crisis and network shutdowns.
Also at The Register, CNET, and TechCrunch (they also found a small cameramaker that is planning to ship on-camera encryption).
(Score: 2) by jcross on Saturday December 17 2016, @12:01AM
Good point, but I think there's a spectrum of reasonableness. The extreme in your example probably does exist, but it's important to understand that such an action is not without risk, especially when dealing with foreign nationals and especially journalists. There's international reputation to consider, if nothing else, and potentially legal complications as well. I think the important thing is that while the journalist might have the protection of being from a powerful country and having a large mouthpiece at their back, their sources probably don't, and this measure extends some protection to the sources where they don't really have any now.
Also it's not that oppressive regimes are "reasonable" so much that they act in their own self-interest, and summarily executing foreign journalists is not without risk for them. Consider the Chief in your example, tasked with actually throwing the journo off the cliff. How does he know that if the story blows up internationally, the dictator won't throw him under the bus by claiming that no orders were issued to that effect. In a place where the journalist can be summarily executed, he might be also, so he's going to make sure to CYA somehow if possible, leaving a paper trail or whatever. So really the self-interest goes all the way down, and corruption or oppression doesn't necessarily translate to "do whatever you want to whoever you want". Even in the absence of law, there can be order.