Two articles crossed my path recently. First, a discussion of all the video Waymo has from outside its cars: in this case related to the LA protests. Second, a discussion of all the video Tesla has from inside its cars.
Lots of things are collecting lots of video of lots of other things. How and under what rules that video is used and reused will be a continuing source of debate.
Clive Robinson • June 19, 2025 10:59 AM
@ Bruce, ALL,
I passed comment on Waymo and Tesla surveillance just the other day in response to @Mr. Peed Off,
So as can be seen it’s something that is on my mind.
The reason for the surveillance is two fold.
Firstly as surprising as it is to some Americans the rest of the world sees,
“The reason behind it is the US is a litigious collection of states and people “on the hustle”. So to protect themselves from law suits the “self drive” / “drive assist” companies collect as much “self defence evidence” as they can.
Call it the “Hot coffee problem” people will complain it’s too cold if their coffee is at a safe temperature… So in the past people used the excuse of “burns from hot coffee” to sue for damages.
This “Corps as a cash machine” attitude gave rise to supposed “copy cat claims” since Stella Liebeck’s 1994 claim. Which many still see as a “shake down” even though she was quite severely injured.
The fact that “self drive vehicle” injuries and fatalities happen is not exactly news, here or on other ICT related blogs.
So Corps see “gathering data” that they hold as being the first step of rejecting injury claims.
The second issue is the problem of,
As such data is automatically “third party business records” that are “collected in a public space” arguably not even a trip to court is required by law enforcement and others.”
Whilst you might not be able to get the evidence there is little to stop law enforcement turning up with just a letter of demand.
The real issue is of course the US has no real comprehensive “Privacy Legislation” in fact almost the opposite. That is “Private data” in effect belongs to the people who collect it, not the people it is about.
The US needs such legislation but no Senior US politician appears to want to seriously sponsor it…
SocraticGadfly • June 19, 2025 4:31 PM
Per Clive, one could argue the Ninth Amendment has an implicit right to privacy, but contra the wingnuts, that is FAR more overlooked than the Tenth Amendment. Goldberg referenced it in Griswold, re a privacy right on contraceptives, but the other more liberal court members didn’t pick up on that.
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Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.
Ian Stewart • June 19, 2025 8:36 AM
Does anyone really care? I was talking to the manager of the gym I go to recently about another gym, that photgraphed everyone who entered. He said there should be complete surveillance everywhere, video, photography, access to all information etc. to catch criminals and fraudsters. He justified it, of course, with that old saw “if you’re not doing anything wrong you’ve nothing to worry about”.