USPS says the cameras, put on USPS truck dashboards, will scan roads, signs, and more.
The United States Postal Service is running a pilot program to put cameras in its mail carrier trucks that continuously scan roads and signs, map roadways and sidewalks, and improve “community safety,” according to a letter posted by a labor union and a statement from the agency to 404 Media. The idea is that, since the trucks are constantly traveling anyway, they can be used as a way to collect data, eventually potentially across the nation.
The letter, written by the United States Postal Service (USPS) Labor Relations to Brian Renfroe, the president of the National Association of Letter Carriers, says the USPS will partner with Next Base, a dashcam company, for the pilot. At the moment, the cameras will be used in the Washington, DC area, and will be installed on a hundred vehicles, the letter says.
On its website, Next Base offers a variety of dash cams, marketed to ordinary drivers, fleet operators, and ride share drivers. Its website says Next Base’s cameras record in up to 4K, and can capture every “license plate” with precision. The cameras don’t run automatic license plate reader (ALPR) software, though.
The pilot was slated to start on September 21, and is expected to last several months, the letter says.
USPS trucks already have 360 degree cameras that capture the outside of the vehicle for a period of time.
I have a camera in my car but it’s just so I can get the license plate numbers off of coal rolling trucks so that I can find out where they live and put sealing foam into their tail pipes. Be the change you want to see in the world.
The part worth watching is the data side of the dashcam-company partnership: who owns the footage, how long it’s kept, and whether it can be shared with police or sold on. USPS is subject to FOIA, so a records request for the pilot agreement and any retention or data-sharing terms is one of the few concrete things people can do here. If the deal really is only about mapping roads and signs, the contract should say so, and if it doesn’t, that’s the story.
Guarantee that data is going to be sold
No need, the murderer is inside the house. Palantir.
Can we pease stop building panopticon
The only “upside” to all this is that the worse it gets the more awareness people have
My local school board installed cameras in the buildings. Ostensibly to track where the shooter is in case there ever is one.
I spoke against this at the meeting by talking about Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon.
I spoke fully 5 minutes before realizing
None of the fucking school board knew who Bentham was or his idea for total surveillance prisons.
I don’t think that is terribly surprising as it is a pretty obscure reference
Should not be obscure to people who ostensibly have degrees in philosophy and/or social science and presume to have the wisdom and foresight to set public education policy
People are dumb sheep. Awareness is going to do jack fucking shit when they’re coked up on social media.
Hard disagree
People are slowly starting to wake up
Normally, I’d agree with you. I was the only person I knew in my whole community that was anti-war in 2001.
But Flock losing 100+ contracts, just in September, and 400+ in 36 states since June suggests that awareness of the problem is translating to mass action via the boring, pedestrian democratic process. (Also a great reminder that while we have no power nationally, we still have power locally.)
Agreed that people are generally sheep. It’s why people still vote D and R, but at least right now, they’re doing something. The overall problem is that it takes way less time for this sort of thing to proliferate than it does for people and the law to catch up.
Are you fucking kidding me? USPS was one of the last US gov entities I partially respected.
Current US postmaster general: David P. Steiner. He was the candidate favored by Trump and said that if a state refuses to give the Trump administration their voter lists, the Postal Service will not mail their ballots. Republicans ruin everything…
Oh, don’t worry. All US presidents from the Democrats are war criminals. They ruin everything too
It could be useful to find and report potholes and other maintenance issues, but I doubt anyone is stupid enough to believe that’s why they’re doing this.
I’m going to park my old, fat ass on my front lawn stark nekkid until they pull those fucking camera out.
When you see your
postal trucktaxpayer funded Google camera trucks with them be sure to take your curbside mailbox down and put a mail slot on your house. Make the fuckers get out and walk to every damn house so they can be vigilant for oily driveways or any sitting water too.Sadly that is not the way it works. Where I’m from the only places that have walking carrier service have always had it and nimbys have prevented change. New developments don’t even get mailbox in front of house but community mail centers/boxes.
Oh well then. Still I’ve always wanted to take a trashcan and stick the front half of a mailbox in it so that the mail just falls down into it. I don’t order packages no more so they have nothing I want.
I’ve always resisted it because it would be disrespectful to postal workers.
But honestly, if you’re going spy on me, help rig our elections, then fuck it, you should be reminded what your job mostly is: spam.
So that’s my filter. It goes strait to trash.
Malicious compliance, baby.
Dig it.
Jokes on them! My mail carrier never comes down my street.
Land of the Free y’all
