Brits have been worried about the "eye in the sky"--the nearly ubiquitous camera system that monitors London. (Maybe they should be more worried about the insect-like drone of the same nickname: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1580986/Microdrone-the-polices-tiny-eye-in-the-sky.html).

However, a proposed vehicular surveillance box has raised importance privacy issues:

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/mar/31/surveillance-transport-communication-box 

From the article:

"The system allows cars to 'talk' to one another and the road. A 'communication box' behind the dashboard ensures that cars send out 'heartbeat' messages every 500 milliseconds through mobile cellular and wireless local area networks, short-range microwave or infrared. The messages will be picked up by other cars in the vicinity, allowing vehicles to warn each other if they are forced to break hard or swerve to avoid a hazard. The data is also picked up by detectors at the roadside and mobile phone towers. That enables the road to communicate with cars, allowing for 'intelligent' traffic lights to turn green when cars are approaching or gantries on the motorway to announce changes to speed limits. Data will also be sent to 'control centres' that manage traffic, enabling a vastly improved system to monitor and even direct vehicles. 'A traffic controller will know where all vehicles are and even where they are headed,' said Kompfner. 'That would result in a significant reduction in congestion and replace the need for cameras.'"

It would, except does this data tell you who is in the car, or if the car hasn't been spoofed (box switched from one car to another, hacked, etc.)? Sure, this causes every privacy-firster to complain, but in reality, isn't this a bigger concern for proof? Provenance of the devices? This approach may actually play into the hands of thugs. Spoof someone else's car, and you're in the clear.

Security is not a patch. It's a quilt. This will augment, not replace, the need for cameras. Privacy people won't be happy--perhaps rightly so. But security will benefit.

Cheers,

Steve