How Police Bought a Drone in Secret Despite Public Disapproval

You may remember that last year in Oakland , the Alameda County Board of Supervisors held apacked public hearingwhere members of the community , joined by EFF and ACLU of Northern California , testified forover three hoursabout worries around Sheriff Greg Ahern ’s plan to incur a dawdler . The consensus at the hearing was clear — at the audience , only one meeter spoke in favour of the acquisition .

And yet , the San Francisco Chroniclerevealedon Tuesday that Sheriff Ahern decided to go ahead and buy a dawdler anyhow — and this clip he ’s doing it with local taxpayer dollars : “ Ahern said he decided to expend $ 97,000 from the county’sOffice of Homeland SecurityandEmergency Servicesto grease one’s palms two small remote-controlled aerial surveillance devices . ”

Sheriff Ahern seems to recollect he has n’t done anything improper , sincehe toldthe Contra Costa Times:”There ’s nothing mystical about what we ’ve done … This is how our department acquire equipment on a regular foundation . ' ”

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This begs the motion : Is Sheriff Ahern saying that on a regular basis , his department has been vehemently inform that the biotic community powerfully oppose a purchase and then run ahead with it anyway ? Is he saying that public vox populi and transparency do n’t matter ?

consort to the Sheriff , “ I made it very percipient that I was still going to acquire drones . ” But Linda Lye of the ACLU of Northern California , who work closely on the issue , “ had been under the impression from exchanges with Ahern that the drone issue had been on the section ’s ‘ back burner . ' ” In fact , she noted : “ This is clear an travail to bypass the public process . ”

How the Sheriff made his intention clean-cut is a mystery — ACLU , EFF , and community groups likeAlameda County Against Droneswere all ready and willing to give feedback on pilotless aircraft in world-wide and on any proposed insurance policy , but were n’t aware that Sheriff Ahern had decided to move forward with his design . patently the Sheriffconducted a surveyof approximately 500 people “ assist an [ Alameda County Sheriff ’s Office]-hosted ‘ Cop Shop BBQ / community meeting ’ in September 2014 . ” But that ’s hardly a representative sample distribution of the residents of Alameda County — and certainly not representative of expert like the ACLU . And even if he did some kind of minimal outreach to the general populace ( perhaps a message in a bottle ? ) that does n’t exchange the fact that the serious worry brought up by the community and privacy proponent have n’t just go aside .

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They ’re not trifle concerns . The Sheriff’sproposed privateness policywasfull of loopholesthat would provide for abuse of a pilotless aircraft , without any literal enforcement for privacy and constitutional violations . The new policy , obtainedandpublishedby Ars Technica , is virtually superposable . And like the old policy , it does n’t need a imprimatur for law enforcement role , something EFF has made clean-cut we believe is thebare minimumfor any drone pipe policy . What ’s more , there has been no real cost - welfare psychoanalysis done , despite testimonial about the potential litigation and other costs that could be incurred by drone . And concerns about how droning could increaseracial and spiritual profilingor be used to monitor protests were never addressed by the Sheriff at all . In fact , he made it percipient that hewouldn’t dominion outusing drones for demonstrations — particularly chilling in light of the tearing stifling of speech that ’s been happen since the law killing of Mike Brown .

Here ’s the irony : Underlying many of the residential district ’s concerns about the Sheriff ’s use of radio-controlled aircraft is the belief that police ca n’t be bank , that they will misuse technology , despite assurances to the contrary , especially in absence seizure of substantial policies or control . By circumventing public operation and ignoring the residential area , Sheriff Ahern has scarcely made himself seem more trustworthy . rather , he ’s proved the assumption to be true .

What happens next is unreadable . At apress conference todaythe Sheriff noted that the FAA has not yet authorise the drones , but that he anticipates that they will be “ quick to deploy within ‘ six months to a year . ' ” EFF will be using that time to supervise the berth and partake our assessment of the problem with this leverage . We go for privacy activists do the same .

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