Homeland Security Pre crime detection

[blackwolfe]

Homeland Security has been working on a pre crime detection system.  Pretty scary to me.

More at link:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20117058-281/homeland-security-moves-forward-with-pre-crime-detection

An internal U.S. Department of Homeland Security document indicates that a controversial program designed to predict whether a person will commit a crime is already being tested on some members of the public voluntarily, CNET has learned.

If this sounds a bit like the Tom Cruise movie called "Minority Report," or the CBS drama "Person of Interest," it is. But where "Minority Report" author Philip K. Dick enlisted psychics to predict crimes, DHS is betting on algorithms: it's building a "prototype screening facility" that it hopes will use factors such as ethnicity, gender, breathing, and heart rate to "detect cues indicative of mal-intent."

 
Excerpt from internal DHS document obtained by the Electronic Privacy Information Center

(Credit: U.S. Department of Homeland Security) The latest developments, which reveal efforts to "collect, process, or retain information on" members of "the public," came to light through an internal DHS document obtained under open-government laws by the Electronic Privacy Information Center. DHS calls its "pre-crime" system Future Attribute Screening Technology, or FAST.

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FAST is designed to track and monitor, among other inputs, body movements, voice pitch changes, prosody changes (alterations in the rhythm and intonation of speech), eye movements, body heat changes, and breathing patterns. Occupation and age are also considered. A government source told CNET that blink rate and pupil variation are measured too.

A field test of FAST has been conducted in at least one undisclosed location in the northeast. "It is not an airport, but it is a large venue that is a suitable substitute for an operational setting," DHS spokesman John Verrico told Nature.com in May

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[Big Frank]

Will they arrest people for crimes they haven't commited yet? And if they prevent the crime from happening does that make you not guilty?

[Conagher 45]

The Federal Gobberment could save millions if they dsiband Homeland security and let the FBI and US Marshals handle the so called problems that may or may not exsisit. 

[tombogan03884]

If it actually works it will never go into general use because it will trigger more often on Blacks and Hispanics so it will be judged racist.

[WatchManUSA]

"Minority Report" author Philip K. Dick enlisted psychics to predict crimes, DHS is betting on algorithms: it's building a "prototype screening facility" that it hopes will use factors such as ethnicity, gender, breathing, and heart rate to "detect cues indicative of mal-intent."

One again, life imitates art.

[Sponsor]

[tombogan03884]

Look at H.G. Wells, several of the things he mentions in "A Trip to the Moon" weren't confirmed until we actually tried it.
Jules Verne's Nautilus in "20,000 leagues under the sea" used nuke power before they had words for it.

[Solus]

This system is doing what an experienced cop might do...and in pretty much the same way.

The cop gets a good "sense" of what a person is about....and with many of the same inputs. 

The cop might not be able to detect some of them unless he is close, like breathing rate changes, but many of the others can be observed and that is exactly what folks aware of, trained in and experienced in spotting shady behavior do.

It is called "Profiling"...and is a good type of Profiling.

Bad type is using only race or ethnic origin as the criteria. 

Bad thing is that PC guidelines label any Profiling that includes race or ethnic origin along with all these other observations as bad.

[tombogan03884]

Blacks and Hispanics make up less than 5% of the NH population, but account for 50% of violent crime.
But Profiling is bad ?
PC BS

[TAB]

Blacks and Hispanics make up less than 5% of the NH population, but account for 50% of violent crime.
But Profiling is bad ?
PC BS

If you ever talk to a old school LEO... you know the ones that actually understand who signs thier check and what thier job is...

will tell you, profiling is the best tool out there and yet they can't use it.

[kmitch200]

If you ever talk to a old school LEO... you know the ones that actually understand who signs thier check and what thier job is...
will tell you, profiling is the best tool out there and yet they can't use it.

They actually use it all the time. (seasoned 'real' cops anyway)

Ever been pulled over and asked "Where are you going, who do you know there, what are you going there for?"
That's "profiling".
It involves a cop using his brain to see if a subject gets nervous or can't come up with real answers. If the subject can't keep a story straight, then the cop knows that something is not right....look closer and keep your guard up. IMHO, young cops that haven't developed that "street smarts" enough and are thrown into service working alone too soon, too often.

Trouble can happen when someone tells the cop "It's really none of your business", they get all puffed up like a frog and want to throw the weight of their badge around instead of realizing that not everyone mindlessly kow-tows to authority.

DHS using this tool WITHOUT any street smarts would only be a lesson in spinning wheels.