From: Jim <jdbtcore@gmail.com> To: NPSTC-PARTICIPANTS@yahoogroups.com Cc:  Date: Mon, 17 Feb 2014 09:43:34 -0500 Subject: Re: [NPSTC-PARTICIPANTS] RE: New T3 Webinar Archives-CVRIA Webinar Series & Open Data On 2/16/2014 11:47 PM, Mahon, Tom (DNR) wrote:

I can see benefits and serious hazards to this technology.
Could the same technology be used to disable a vehicle being pursued by police?  (Or, would smart crook would find a way to disable the device.)

Yes. Or they could disable any vehicle they feel like, at any time. They are already using license plate recognition on every car they get behind. It then keeps a record of everything associated with that plate.

Could it be used to monitor someone’s travel route and time? (Wouldn’t a search warrant normally be required?)

Yes and yes. But of course, there are lots of things that require a warrant that have been bypassed by federal agencies. You know, like cell phone records, etc…

Could a stalker or angry ex-spouse use the technology to pursue their victim?  (Who would be liable for the unintended consequences? Wrongful death?  Domestic Violence?)

Yes, and likely no one.

What’s to stop someone from hacking the system and causing havoc on the highway by sending out false messages to other vehicles?  (The jerks that get their kicks writing a computer virus will have fun with this stuff.)

Not much, if anything.

The traffic accident in the fog scenario can be solved by low-power active radar, without opening the civil-rights can of worms. Something similar could even be tailored to alert a driver that dozed off and is headed off the road.  (Of course, the traffic accident in the fog can be prevented by drivers that have the ability to lift their foot off the gas pedal.)
Personally, I am convinced that technology is running far ahead of the social and legal framework.  I see a major civil-rights law suit ahead for this technology.  (George Orwell saw it coming.)

That’s being nice. Anybody who uses Windows knows how unreliable it is. Having a computer making decisions about the vehicle I’m riding in is not acceptable. It’s one thing to set off a ‘beeper’ of some sort when it senses something, it’s quite another to let it smash  the brakes or turn the wheel on it’s own. People WILL DIE. We just turned in a leased vehicle that had the back-up alert. It would false positive 9 times out of 10. If the car had been allowed to actually hit the brakes when it did that, we would never have been able to back out of our own driveway, let alone a space in a parking lot. Can you imagine if it had the same kind of sensor for forward motion, and it could hit the brakes or turn the wheel on it’s own?