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from the Not-that-NSA,-the-other-one. dept.
The US National Sheriffs' Association wants Google to block its crowd-sourced traffic app Waze from being able to report the position of police officers, saying the information is putting officer's lives at risk.
"The police community needs to coordinate an effort to have the owner, Google, act like the responsible corporate citizen they have always been and remove this feature from the application even before any litigation or statutory action," AP reports Sheriff Mike Brown, the chairman of the NSA's technology committee, told the association's winter conference in Washington.
Waze, founded in 2008 and purchased 18 months ago by Google for $1.1bn, has about 50 million users who anonymously share their locations to help gauge road traffic flows. The app also allows police reports and road closures to be added to maps and shared with other users.
Brown called the app a "police stalker," and said being able to identify where officers were located could put them at personal risk. Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, said his members had concerns as well.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/01/26/nsa_gunning_for_google_wants_copspotting_taken_off_waze_app/
(Score: 3, Informative) by arashi no garou on Tuesday January 27 2015, @09:16PM
In a way, you have a point. Then there's the guy in the Wal-mart who was leaning on a toy gun with the orange nub intact, who was shot in the back as soon as the officer saw him. No talking, no negotiation, no assessing the situation. He was a black man holding a toy gun, and that was enough excuse to shoot first and never ask questions.
So, no, the orange nub does absolutely nothing to make you safer. If the officer is intent on killing someone that day (and especially, it seems, if you're a person of color or just look "undesirable"), you're dead on your feet.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday January 27 2015, @10:03PM
So, no, the orange nub does absolutely nothing to make you safer. If the officer is intent on killing someone that day (and especially, it seems, if you're a person of color or just look "undesirable"), you're dead on your feet.
No, you just cited one specific instance where the nub didn't help. There are still plenty of times when it does, when e.g. the officer isn't just out to shoot somebody.
Don't say "absolutely nothing" when it's so trivial to disprove your argument.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday January 27 2015, @11:17PM
Thanks for the reminder to paint the muzzles orange on all my real guns.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by arashi no garou on Tuesday January 27 2015, @11:39PM
One instance out of many. By the same token, you can't claim that every single time an officer saw a toy gun with an orange nub, he magically didn't shoot.
And I said "absolutely nothing" because in that case it did "absolutely nothing" to prevent a death. Whether the gun he was holding had the nub or not didn't matter, because that officer set out to murder someone that day.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday January 28 2015, @02:30AM
I'm willing to bet that keeping the safety tips ON provides a BETTER chance of not getting shot for the pool of all incidents of this type.
There, are our senses of pedanticosity satisfied yet?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @12:06AM
Ohio is an open-carry state.
If the toy gun had instead been a real weapon loaded with real bullets, the dude would have been within his rights to possess it pretty much anywhere in that state.
He was murdered by racist cops in a racist city because of the color of his skin.
The racist jerk that called it in and lied about the facts is culpable as well.
The 12 year old who was shot within seconds of the racist cop showing up on the scene didn't stand a chance either.
-- gewg_