0:00:00.149,0:00:03.757
The shocking police[br]crackdown

0:00:03.757,0:00:05.842
on protestors in [br]Ferguson, Missouri,

0:00:05.842,0:00:08.899
in the wake of the police [br]shooting of Michael Brown,

0:00:08.899,0:00:13.342
underscored the extent to which advanced[br]military weapons and equipment,

0:00:13.342,0:00:14.824
designed for the battlefield,

0:00:14.824,0:00:16.073
are making their way[br]

0:00:16.073,0:00:20.774
to small-town police departments[br]across the United States.

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Although much tougher to observe,

0:00:22.700,0:00:26.197
this same thing is happening [br]with surveillance equipment.

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NSA-style mass [br]surveillance is enabling

0:00:28.947,0:00:31.965
local police departments [br]to gather vast quantities

0:00:31.965,0:00:33.742
of sensitive informaiton

0:00:33.742,0:00:35.283
about each and every one of us

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in a way that was[br]never previously possible.

0:00:39.734,0:00:43.110
Location information can [br]be very sensitive.

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If you drive your car around[br]the United States,

0:00:45.391,0:00:47.524
it can reveal if you go [br]to a therapist,

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attend an Alcoholic Anonymous meeting,

0:00:50.012,0:00:52.973
if you go to church [br]or if you don't go to church.

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And when that [br]information about you

0:00:54.689,0:00:56.514
is combined with the same[br]information

0:00:56.514,0:00:58.077
about everyone else,

0:00:58.077,0:01:00.398
the government can gain a[br]detailed portrait

0:01:00.398,0:01:03.564
of how private citizens interact.

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This information used to be private.

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Thanks to modern technology,

0:01:07.522,0:01:09.340
the government knows [br]far too much

0:01:09.340,0:01:11.820
about what happens[br]behind closed doors.

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And local police departments[br]make decisions

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about who they [br]think you are

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based on this information.

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One of the key technologies [br]driving mass-location tracking

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is the innocuous-sounding[br]Automatic License Plate Reader.

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if you haven't seen one,

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it's probably because you didn't[br]know what to look for

0:01:31.657,0:01:33.222
--they're everywhere.

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Mounted on roads or [br]on police cars,

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Automatic License Plate Readers[br]capture images of every passing car

0:01:40.533,0:01:42.048
and convert the license plate

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into machine-readable text

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so that they can be checked[br]against hot lists

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of cars potentially wanted[br]for wrongdoing.

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But more than that, increasingly,

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local police departments are [br]keeping records not just

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of people wanted [br]for wrongdoing,

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but every plate that [br]passes them by,

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resulting in the collection[br]of mass quantities of data

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about where Americans [br]have gone.

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Did you know this[br]was happening?

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When Mike Katz-Lacabe asked[br]his local police department

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for information about the Plate[br]Reader data they had on him,

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this is what they got:

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in addition to the date, [br]time and location,

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the police department had [br]photographs that captured

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where he was going and [br]often, who he was with.

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The second photo [br]from the top

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is a picture of Mike and[br]his two duaghters

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getting out of their car[br]in their own driveway.

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The government has [br]hundreds of photos like this

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about Mike going about [br]his daily life.

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And if you drive a car [br]in the United States,

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I would bet money [br]that they have photographs

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like this of you going[br]about your daily life.

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Mike hasn't done[br]anything wrong.

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Why is it okay that [br]the government

0:02:52.704,0:02:55.032
is keeping all of[br]this information?

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The reason it's happening[br]is because

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as the cost of storing[br]this data has plummeted,

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the police department [br]simply hangs on to it,[br]

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just in case it could be [br]useful someday.

0:03:06.676,0:03:09.546
The issue is not just that[br]one police department

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is gathering this information[br]in isolation,

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or even that multiple police [br]departments are doing it.

0:03:14.656,0:03:16.743
At the same time, [br]the Federal Government

0:03:16.743,0:03:20.361
is collecting all of these[br]individual pots of data,

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and pooling them together [br]into one vast database

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with hundreds of [br]millions of hits

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showing where Americans[br]have traveled.

0:03:28.006,0:03:30.964
This document from the [br]Federal Drug Enforcement Administration,

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which is one of the agencies[br]primarily interested in this,

0:03:33.729,0:03:38.386
is one of several that reveal [br]the existence of this database.

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Meanwhile, in New York City,

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the NYPD has driven police cars

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equipped with License Plate Readers

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past mosques in order to[br]figure out who is attending.

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The uses and abuses [br]of this technology

0:03:50.845,0:03:53.249
aren't limited to the United States.

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In the UK, the police deparmtnet

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put 80-year-old John Kat[br]on a Plate Reader watch list

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after he had attended dozens of[br]lawful political demonstrations

0:04:04.395,0:04:08.771
where he liked to sit on a bench[br]and sketch the attendees.

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License Plate Readers aren't the[br]only mass-location tracking technology

0:04:12.293,0:04:15.099
available to law enforcement[br]agents today.

0:04:15.099,0:04:17.461
Through a technique known as[br]a Cell Tower Dump,

0:04:17.461,0:04:20.923
law enforcement agents can[br]uncover who was using

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one or more cell towers[br]at a particular time,

0:04:23.258,0:04:25.050
a technique which [br]has known to reveal

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the location of [br]tens of thousands

0:04:26.911,0:04:29.809
and even hundreds [br]of thousands of people.

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Also, using a device [br]known as a Sting Ray,

0:04:32.549,0:04:35.185
law enforcement agents[br]can send tracking signals

0:04:35.185,0:04:37.112
inside people's houses

0:04:37.112,0:04:39.860
to identify the cell phones [br]located there.

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And if they don't know[br]which house to target,

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they've been known to drive

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this technology around through[br]whole neighborhoods.

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Just as the police in Ferguson possess [br]high-tech weapons and equipment,

0:04:52.060,0:04:55.042
so too do police departments across[br]the United States possess

0:04:55.042,0:04:57.687
high-tech surveillance gear.

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Just because we don't see it,

0:04:59.408,0:05:02.043
doesn't mean it's not there.

0:05:02.043,0:05:04.564
The question is, what should[br]we do about this?

0:05:04.564,0:05:07.654
I think this poses a serious[br]civil liberties threat.

0:05:07.654,0:05:09.406
History has shown that once

0:05:09.406,0:05:12.087
the police have massive [br]quantities of data,

0:05:12.087,0:05:14.515
tracking the movements [br]of innocent people,

0:05:14.515,0:05:17.097
it gets abused, maybe for [br]blackmail,

0:05:17.097,0:05:18.821
maybe for political advantage,

0:05:18.821,0:05:21.030
or maybe for [br]simple voyeurism.

0:05:21.030,0:05:23.492
Fortunately, there are[br]steps we can take.

0:05:23.492,0:05:27.072
Local police departments can [br]be governed by the city councils,

0:05:27.072,0:05:29.687
which can pass laws[br]requiring the police

0:05:29.687,0:05:32.468
to dispose of the data [br]about innocent people

0:05:32.468,0:05:34.958
while allowing the legitimate[br]uses of the technology

0:05:34.958,0:05:36.079
to go forward.

0:05:36.079,0:05:36.993
Thank you.

0:05:36.993,0:05:41.424
(Applause).