For years The Valley Patriot has been blowing the alarm bells on government overreach and mass surveillance of the public “for your safety” of course.
Our most recent editorial was last October when we published “Creeping Fascism at the Local Level, You Are NOT Paying Attention!” where we – once again – warned of the use of public cameras to surveil the public, detailing the abuse of such technology to keep a database of your every movement.
This technology also stores data on who you are with, accesses your cell phone data, and even records your conversations.
We are pleased that – finally, people in power are starting to listen and starting to act to correct this injustice.
At issue is Methuen Mayor D.J. Beauregard, who started out saying he wanted to audit the system but then announced abruptly that he was removing FLOCK in favor of a less integrated camera system where the city maintains local ownership and control of the data, with strict limits on access, retention and information sharing.
The sudden move came after Methuen City Councilor Patricia Valley revealed that her car had been searched in Lawrence on the FLOCK camera system even though her car was not involved in the hit and run Lawrence Police were investigating.
Beauregard is also calling for a temporary halt to any proposed data centers in Methuen.
BRAVO!!
Yes, at least one leader in the Valley is listening to reason when it comes to government overreach and this is critical to our freedoms here at the local level.
Besides the obvious – and widely covered – examples of police officers and civilians abusing this technology to stalk lovers, politicians using it to set up their political opponents, or creepy FLOCK employees surveilling children, there is a much larger issue at hand here.
While it is true that that Supreme Court has long ruled that you do not have “privacy” rights in public, just two months ago the court ruled in the “Geofencing” case that police conduct a Fourth Amendment “search” when they obtain a person’s cell-phone location history from Google because individuals have a reasonable expectation of privacy in that location data – even when those movements occur in public.
(Chatrie v. United States, Docket No. 25-112, cited as 609 U.S.)
We applaud Mayor Beauregard and urge the Methuen City Council to rescind all funding for any type of FLOCK or AI, license plate readers and facial recognition systems stationed in public to surveil the public when no crime has been committed.
While Methuen only has a few of these cameras, Lawrence has a plethora of FLOCK cameras documenting your every move within that city.
Sure, these systems reduce crime, but we could cut 100% of all crime tomorrow if we just suspend the Constitution. Keeping these systems in place is the slippery slope that starts that process.
It’s time for leaders to show actual leadership here before it’s too late.
We urge officials in Lawrence, North Andover, Haverhill, Lowell, and other communities to take a leadership position on these intrusions on our civil liberties. ◊