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from the I-see-what-you-did-there.-signed-Big-Brother dept.
China has been using biometric technologies for a while to scan the public. Now they are being used to identify jaywalkers and send them warning via SMS, along with a fine.
China plans to roll out a national social credit system by 2020, which will keep a record of citizens' violation of laws and directly affect their ability to do things like get a loan or get hired for a job. According to the South China Morning Post, devices like the jaywalking facial recognition system will be part of this network to keep track of the number of jaywalking violations and change a person's social credit score accordingly.
Major cities have already deployed similar facial recognition activities to monitor traffic behavior and track drivers.
From Motherboard : China Is Using Facial Recognition Technology to Send Jaywalkers Fines Through Text Messages.
See also South China Morning Post : Jaywalkers under surveillance in Shenzhen soon to be punished via text messages.
(Score: 2) by archfeld on Friday March 30 2018, @08:01PM (1 child)
I would think the lawyers made more money when there was no clear at fault perpetrator, and the case had to be litigated. Don't they get paid by the hour ?
For the NSA : Explosives, guns, assassination, conspiracy, primers, detonators, initiators, main charge, nuclear charge
(Score: 3, Interesting) by theluggage on Saturday March 31 2018, @12:06PM
...but then they might lose and can only charge what the client is willing to pay (and have to compete with other lawyers for the business). If there's clear fault, they can do it on "no win, no fee", probably get the defendant to settle by writing a couple of letters, and the defendant pays damages which include whatever fees the lawyer thinks they deserve (including any losses from "lost" cases)...
Get rear-ended by an insured driver and see how many lawyers cold-call you. Your insurance company will actually pimp out your details to personal injury lawyers and overpriced replacement car hire companies (the other party's insurance pays - there's no way any sane person would voluntarily pay their rates). I actually had one of these cowboy outfits phone up the garage that was repairing my car and try to cancel the (crap, but adequate, cheap and convenient located at the exact place where I needed to drop off and collect my car) courtesy car they'd offered. Nope, an at-fault accident triggers a feeding frenzy in the shark tank.
Now rear-end someone yourself and enjoy the silence (and wait for the gold-plated bill for valeting the victim's car).
One might think that its in the interest of insurance companies to keep awards down, too... But why? They're not paying - their other policyholders and underwriters are (and that risk has probably been 'commoditised' and sold on - you're rarely dealing with the actual underwriters), and if liability settlements start looking affordable, well, the advice goes: "never pay to insure what you can afford to replace" - where would the insurance industry be if people weren't scared of being hit by 6-7 figure liabilities? Any good casino wants a steady stream of winners to bring in the punters - as long as it's predictable and they can adjust their rake-off to cover it.