In 2015, Radio Lab ran a fascinating story about a re-purposed military project that put a drone in the sky all day long to film an entire city in high resolution. This allows the operators to rewind the tape and track anyone moving, forward or backward, anywhere within the city. It’s an amazing tool for fighting crime. And it’s a remarkable privacy intrusion.
The question was, would Americans be ok with this? I figured it was just a matter of time. Maybe another DC sniper would create the push for it.
Five years later Baltimore is the first off the sidelines, and the ACLU is suing to stop them:
The American Civil Liberties Union has sued to stop Baltimore police from launching a sweeping “eye in the sky” surveillance program. The initiative, operated by a company called Persistent Surveillance Systems (PSS), would send planes flying over Baltimore at least 40 hours a week as they almost continuously collect wide-angle photos of the city. If not blocked, a pilot program is expected to begin later this year.
Lawsuit fights new Baltimore aerial surveillance program