Nowhere left to hide

By Katharine Mieszkowski

Published June 20, 2001 7:00PM (EDT)

Read the story.

It's our own fault. Now that we've allowed ourselves to be demographic groups for fast food and big-budget Hollywood, this is the next natural step for them. I'm actually surprised that Crime.com isn't a TV show instead of a Web site. I would agree with Eisenberg, except again, we did it to ourselves. The country is so sue-happy that I don't blame jails for broadcasting. At least this way if anything happens, no one can change or hide anything. While I don't necessarily agree with cameras everywhere, I do wish people would quit worrying so much about criminals' rights. Why do they have any?

-- Darren

I found it quite amusing that as I was reading about how our privacy is shrinking due to the omnipresence of cheap video cameras, your site popped up an ad for the X10 with the tag line:

Surround Home With Video!

Et tu Salon?

-- Steven Maurer

Not only are we taped buying a pack of smokes at 7-Eleven, but it has come to my attention that several porn sites have bathroom cams or fitting-room cams or shower cams. This is disturbing, given that minicams are quite easy to buy.

Ladies, we just can't do anything "private" outside our own homes. Unless, of course, you don't mind being seen on fetish porn sites or the computer screen of a sicko near you.

And don't get me started on the potential use by stalkers, especially dangerous serial stalkers, of face-recognition technology.

-- Mallory Shipman

I'm a law-abiding citizen, and I'm absolutely scared by what you have said in this article. Video surveillance in stores? Fine. Cameras in courtrooms? Fine. A camera hooked to a computer that can recognize who I am, where I live, cross-reference that information to a database with my address and phone number, and then e-mail or telephone my employer when I go into a porn store to let them know I'm engaging in an "immoral" activity (which is exactly how the religious right would use it, mark my words)? Not fine.

We have to stop this before it is too late, before we are pulled aside and questioned for simply driving through an area known for drug dealing, before we are fired for engaging in activities that our employer doesn't approve of. Problem is, none of us have the balls anymore to stand up and fight.

-- Kyle Nally


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