UK License Plate Cameras Have "Gaps In Coverage" 283
Aguazul2 writes "UK police are sad that despite having the most comprehensive driver surveillance system of any developed country, there are still gaps in their coverage. From the article: 'The cameras automatically record plate/time/location information and send it to a central data store, which has complete nationwide records for 6 years.' Also interesting is that an unspecified 'particular driving style' can be used to evade detection by the cameras. It appears, however, that criminals are well aware of the cameras and take other routes. Big Brother technology, coming soon to a country near you!"
Not Gaps (Score:5, Interesting)
How the system works (Score:5, Interesting)
I used to work on license plate recognition about a decade ago. Typically there are problems with illumination, motion and noise. So what the systems try to do is boost illumination (often by hidden IR lights) and decrease motion related blur by taking multiple shots and integrating images and/or filtering the results. All this algorithms have some built in assumptions about the expected area of interest, scale and most likely motion. Suppose you detect license plate at some position and scale in frame N. To boost the probability of being correct, you want to check if you can find the same plate number in frame N+1 and possibly N+2. Detection is all about probability. There are some thresholds built in that on one side maximize the probability of license plate detection and on the other side minimize pollution of the database with bad results. So in short, if your license plate is dirty and your trajectory is not what the system expects (changing lanes and velocity) it's more likely the system will not store the result. If you know the specifics of the particular system, you may beat it easily, like if the system first looks for the plate frame, you can mask or offset the frame, or if you know about the exact illumination filtering procedure you may add some conflicting structured illumination.
Re:SCORPION STARE (Score:5, Interesting)
I think the "unspecified driving style" is to drive straddling 2 lanes, then the alignment of the camera is wrong. They do say it's impractical ...
Re:tick tock (Score:1, Interesting)
It's both for safety and for economic gain via improved traffic flow. These things aren't meant to create some kind of marauder's map of cars in the country so civil servants can giggle at how much they know about you. They are average speed cameras, meant to replace older radar speed cameras.
If you measure speed at only one point, people find out where the cameras are and exceed the limit between cameras then slow down dramatically as they are about to pass the speed trap. That's both dangerous and it wrecks the smooth flow of traffic.
Tracking average speed over a long stretch of road genuinely is safer.
Re:tick tock (Score:5, Interesting)
Well basically, people end up forced to disguise motives for actions taken if they don't comply with a social status quo that demands moral justifications for almost everything. In other words, one doesn't have a right to something unless it complies with a 'universal' morality. As this status quo becomes less and less compatible with basic human needs, it breeds all kinds of passive aggressive behavior as individuals attempt to get their legitimate needs filled without feeling institutionally programmed guilt or getting in to trouble with authority. Today, it's bad enough that it's almost impossible to have a truly honest discussion about anything truly important nowadays, never mind live truly satisfying lives. I think this dynamic is one of the first causes of political problems in western countries, or any country that claims a representative government. The more 'socialized' and interconnected the society, the more powerful this dynamic becomes.
His statements about 'lack of meaningful work' are also interesting. Having large numbers of people seriously unsatisfied with the daily grinds they must endure is definitely a key component of social unrest. We anesthetize ourselves with cheesy entertainment or embed ourselves in (or generate) trivial real life drama to hide from this. Sometimes we combine the two (reality tv). While most would be quick to state how hard the back breaking rural lifestyle was, 12hr work days cooped up in office buildings are not any better. They may in fact be worse. He sees technology as the enemy because of this.
As far as technology goes, I admit it enables this to happen with more efficiency, but I think the solution lies in fixing the root causes, not attacking tools. As the drug and gun wars have shown, attacking tools solves nothing.
Murdoch Newspapers & TV (Score:2, Interesting)
Murdoch's papers (News of the World) use to buy information from the police. They even admitted as much to Parliament inquiry as though they were above the law.
I bet they bought the logs of where famous stars and politicians went, when and how.
And if Murdoch can buy that info, how many times do you think other criminals have bought that info. Just as the vehicle registration office was selling license plate information to clamping outfits, debt collectors, pretty much anyone who wanted it, I bet the police have been selling this information too.
What is the betting that's is sold to insurance companies, debt companies, private investigators. Maybe not legally, but then Murdochs Notw buying wasn't legal either.
Re:tick tock (Score:5, Interesting)
Sure, but road design and layout is the biggest external factor. The problem is that speed limit benefits are interpreted as a slippery slope argument for the sake of lowering them to increase revenue. The lower it is, the 'safer' things are assumed to be, making the speeding 'offense' ever more egregious.. The logical conclusion is to ban driving altogether.. now everyone's safe, right?
I'm not saying there are always idiots (though that's also true), I'm saying that lowering the expected levels of performance makes better idiots.. People adapt themselves to the new normals, and the accident levels creep back up again. With modern cars, that creep levels off pretty damn close to the same level as the above-limit speeds most people travel at. 65 or 80, the accident levels for most stretches of highway are similar enough that strict enforcement of 65 is pointless. For the most part, the limits are changed along roads for no rhyme or reason unless that particular state wants to set up traps for revenue. Obviously, I'm leaving out situations where it does make some sense, like construction, though even there, the 'temporary' speed limit signs are enforced even when no workers are present and there is no other hazard. I've seen situations where these 'temporary' signs are still up a year after the work was completed, complete with two cop cars sitting around waiting to ticket 'speeders.' So while you're technically correct, the reality is that a fatal accident at 80 is most likely going to be a fatal accident at 65 in most highway situations. It's just assumed by the law that the speeding was the fault, when it it's more likely due to some other behavior causing inattention. The same thing goes with the 35-50 zones on most backroads. 'most' being the operator here. Ideally, funds from tickets should go to civil projects to redesign areas with recurrent accident problems instead of law enforcement budgets.
I'd rather have alert drivers going 80, than a bunch of cellphone yammering idiots going 60. If the real goal is safety, the best thing we can do is tear down the road mounted cell towers. Interactive communication is as distracting as intoxication.
Re:tick tock (Score:4, Interesting)
If you measure speed at only one point, people find out where the cameras are and exceed the limit between cameras then slow down dramatically as they are about to pass the speed trap. That's both dangerous and it wrecks the smooth flow of traffic.
I can tell you that these f***ing retards looking for traffic cameras wreck things. When you leave London eastwards on the A13, you will regularly find these braind ead morons who go totally bonkers behind you when you don't go enough above the speed limit for their taste, and then they pass you, notice the next speeding camera, slam the brakes and force you to brake as well, slowing down well below the speed limit.
:-)
On one fine day a managed to drive behind a police car, exactly at the speed limit just as the police car did, noticed one idiot approaching behind me much too fast, lights flashing, indicator out, and I moved into the other lane just as he reached me. He didn't _quite_ crash into the police car, but they stopped him
Re:tick tock (Score:5, Interesting)
Perhaps you are forgetting that the UK has a functioning democracy?
Not really, and road laws are a prime example.
If we made these laws on a democratic basis, we wouldn't have absurd situations like we have in Cambridge right now, where ironically it is the police themselves who have said there is no point in trying to enforce a reduction in speed limit to 20mph on a lot of roads at the moment because almost driver ignores them. The main people who seem to want those limits are people who live in the big, expensive houses along those roads, and a few local councillors primarily elected by such people. Our city council as a whole has a fairly poor reputation in terms of being blatantly anti-motorist, but given the tiny electorate for each councillor that means most people who use our roads don't actually get a vote on the people making the policy, we do not have a functioning democracy in this respect.
It's even worse on a national level, because this whole ANPR business seems to have been started on the quiet by the police themselves. Part of the controversy is because the whole surveillance operation had little if any oversight by elected officials at that stage and was effectively presented as a fait accompli.