Back in 2013, the Security Scrapbook featured Seattle's new citywide surveillance system. "A New Apparatus Capable of Spying on You Has Been Installed Throughout Downtown Seattle. Very Few Citizens Know What It Is, and Officials Don’t Want to Talk About It."
2018...
Five years after activists forced Seattle's mayor to return the city's surveillance drones to their manufacturer, the city has announced that it is terminating its warrantless mass-surveillance program altogether.
The DHS gave the city a $3.6m grant to build out a mesh wireless network that could be enjoyed by the public and also provide communications services during emergencies -- but it was also specked to do continuous location-based surveillance as well as CCTV surveillance from lightpoles all over the city.
Activists worked with the ACLU to pressure the city to work with police to produce a privacy policy that would explain when this data would be gathered, how long it would be retained, and how it would be used. The devices were switched off while these questions were to be answered.
Five years on, the police and city were unable to articulate an answer to these questions, and so now they're spending $150,000 to tear all the gear (including the mesh networking access points) out, rather than accept any limitations on their use. more
