The remote control helicopter, fitted with CCTV cameras, will be used by officers in Merseyside to track criminals and record anti-social behaviour.
The drone is only a metre wide, weighs less than a bag of sugar, and can record images from a height of 500m.
It was originally used for military reconnaissance but is now being trialled by a mainstream police force.
Police chief's 'Orwellian' fears
A senior police officer has said he fears the spread of CCTV cameras is leading to "an Orwellian situation".
Deputy chief constable of Hampshire Ian Readhead said Britain could become a surveillance society with cameras on every street corner.
(Thanks to Nick Redfern and UFOMystic.)
3 comments:
Why do I keep having fantasies of buying a surplus shoulder-launched surface-to-air missile every time I read a story like this?
--WMB as Anon
The more disturbing thing is that this “flying cop” will not just record potential criminal activity (nothing wrong with that - providing it’s real, hard criminal activity and not just someone driving 3 miles over the speed limit, etc); but that it is also going to be used to record “anti social” behaviour.
Who decides what is “ant-social”? I took part in a lot of organised demos in the UK to legitimately protest at various things for years (animal rights etc).
Is some scum politician going to say that the right to demonstration is anti-social? You can bet they are. In fact, they already are.
At the risk of sounding like a rabid conspiracy theorist (rather than a standard conspiracy theorist LOL), I see steps being taken to have a whole society that doesn’t question things; that is told what is good for it; of a government that wants us to think it knows what is right for us; and where if you ask awkward questions you are perceived as a trouble-maker whose actions make you justifiably ripe for official surveillance.
It’s all rubbish of course. And what will happen is exactly what happened re the Poll Tax riots, the Miner’s Strike etc: push the British people a bit, and they’ll discuss things with their mates over a pint in the pub about what the people of the country should do.
Push them a bit more and there will be demos, etc. Push them even further and it will be exactly like the Miner’s Strike and the Poll Tax Riots: people won’t stand for their lives being messed around with like this, and they will stand up and there will be a huge backlash.
Or they shouldn’t stand for it, if they want to hang on to their civil liberties.
Hmmmm...you're right, Nick.
Who and how is "anti-social" defined?
Would it be anti-social for me to use my key-chain high-powered laser pointer on the spy-helo? Spy vs spy.
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