But then if this least generous interpretation you chose represented my train of thought, one would have expected me to clearly argue that both "road cameras" and "mobile service providers" are illegal. Instead I replied with, "Agreed." Did you read down to those parts? If so I'm curious what you thought that could mean in a worldview where police cannot legally investigate crimes.
That makes a lot of sense now that I think about it. If the initial thesis sounds fatuous, inconsistencies that come later wouldn't necessarily stand out.
Traditional methods are just fine. Some technological methods are fine, others are not.
> English needs parenthetical binding.
No I think it is. (Enough to take) care when communicating and rely on our falcuties to rveceor qikucly form flaiures wehn tehy hppean().
No, probably not.
The last aerial photo, with a gas station, the police would certainly be able to get warrants for security cameras for the whole area. Warrants require only reasonable belief that they would lead to evidence of a crime. All cameras pointed at the location that a crime was committed would be reasonably likely to contain footage of the robber.
The earlier photos, with 2-5 blocks of coverage, it's less clear, but still likely that the police would be able to get a warrant. The perps driving the get-away car is evidence and cops only need to show that there is a reason to believe that the camera footage shows a glimpse of the get-away car to get the footage.
Agreed. Also, all methods of gathering evidence from a group of innocent people are not legal. So let's take your examples one at a time:
> Police collects data from security cameras,
If a proprietor wishes to give the police footage. If not, they need a warrant in the U.S. to search them. If the police asked for a general warrant to go collect footage from everyone's security cameras in the same area it would probably have been denied, no?
> road cameras,
Agreed.
> credit card purchases,
Citation needed for local law enforcement getting a general warrant to run a credit card purchase history search "so expansive in time and geography that it had the potential to gather data on tens of thousands of Minnesotans."
> witnesses,
Again, citation needed where police can force tens of thousands of witnesses to answer questions and/or submit relevant data to the police.
> and now from mobile service providers.
Agreed.
> I agree that privacy erosion is real, but you argument was not convincing.
I agree it's not very persuasive, but neither is your counterargument. I'd like to have a deeper discussion about what triggers a violation of constitutional rights, and how to design technology that doesn't threaten to erode those protections.