The Daily Newarker

“Newark and the Future of Crime Fighting”:http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/09/01/0057225&from=rss

Slashdot, a popular technology blog, picks up the “future of crime fighting” meme kicked off by “TechCrunch’s interview with Mayor Booker”:http://dailynewarker.com/blog/2008/08/newark-and-the-future-of-crime-fighting/. The discussion is, unsurprisingly, negative against the cameras due to potential civil-rights violations with regard to privacy.

Booker is quick to point out that the city worked with the ACLU to define a framework around how police can use the cameras (i.e. the NPD can only observe streets, not inside of buildings), in which all have found satisfactory.

“Newark Mayor Cory Booker is “betting that cutting-edge technology will reduce crime”:http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2008/tc20080822_240216.htm and spark an economic renaissance. From a newly opened Surveillance Operations Center, cops armed with joystick controllers “monitor live video feeds from more than 100 donated cameras”:http://www.wcbs880.com/pages/2523084.php?imageGalleryXRefId=610772 scattered across the crime-ridden city. The moves are drawing kudos from businesses like Amazon subsidiary Audible.com, which has moved its HQ to downtown Newark, where space is 50% cheaper than in Manhattan. But are citizens giving up too much privacy?”