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Stop CCTV and Facial Recognition | UK Column Interviews · UK Column Radio

0:07
Speaker 1: Hello everyone, This is Dianah's fisting with UK Column. I'm
0:11
Speaker 1: here today in the center of Newcastle with Nathan Allenby,
0:15
Speaker 1: who is not entirely unfamiliar to UK column. I believe
0:18
Speaker 1: you did a tour of Eastern Europe with Brian Gerrish
0:21
Speaker 1: about fifteen years ago, is that correct?
0:23
Speaker 2: In twenty thirteen we went to Prague together and we
0:27
Speaker 2: met activists from a series of other countries who came
0:30
Speaker 2: there to meet us. So it was actually I found
0:35
Speaker 2: a very useful experience and a lot of people, a
0:39
Speaker 2: lot of people at the far side of Europe watch
0:41
Speaker 2: UK column and they get inspiration from the example it sets.
0:46
Speaker 1: That's great to hear. Did you have a good time
0:48
Speaker 1: with Brian?
0:49
Speaker 2: Absolutely? What a great place and yes, we had a
0:53
Speaker 2: lot of fun.
0:55
Speaker 1: That's great. So you know, we've been in touch over time.
0:58
Speaker 1: You and I have been in you know, similar social
1:00
Speaker 1: groups up here in the northeast of England and it's
1:02
Speaker 1: been great to get to know you over the past
1:04
Speaker 1: little while. So normally we're meeting over a cup of coffee,
1:08
Speaker 1: but here we're here to actually look at some things
1:11
Speaker 1: that are pretty serious in the country and ultimately, I
1:14
Speaker 1: believe worldwide indeed. Actually, so I know you've been an
1:17
Speaker 1: activist for a long time to kind of fight the
1:20
Speaker 1: typic globalst tyranny and other things around the world, which
1:23
Speaker 1: is part of why I'm sure you were working with
1:25
Speaker 1: Brian all those years ago. By the way, we'll put
1:28
Speaker 1: a link to the YouTube video and the show notes
1:31
Speaker 1: and the write up for this interview so people can
1:32
Speaker 1: see what you looked like or when Brian looked like
1:35
Speaker 1: well back at twenty thirteen. It's been a few years,
1:38
Speaker 1: but I think you know you were on UK column
1:41
Speaker 1: News with us just a couple of weeks ago. We
1:44
Speaker 1: played a clip of you doing a protest against sort
1:48
Speaker 1: of the surveillance and the CCTV and all of these
1:50
Speaker 1: things that they're bringing into the country, and so that's
1:54
Speaker 1: what we wanted to talk to you about today, about
1:56
Speaker 1: the work that you've been doing and that your group
1:58
Speaker 1: is doing, and then maybe do a little bit of
2:00
Speaker 1: a tour around the city center and show people some
2:03
Speaker 1: examples of what's actually going on, because I don't think
2:05
Speaker 1: that people necessarily know I don't notice when they're just
2:09
Speaker 1: walking around to see all of the cameras and the
2:12
Speaker 1: technologies that are tracking everything that we do. So if
2:17
Speaker 1: you want to give us a little bit of information
2:19
Speaker 1: about your background in activism, which I know you've been
2:21
Speaker 1: doing for decades, and how did you end up being
2:24
Speaker 1: active in the snow CCTV group that you were protesting
2:28
Speaker 1: with a couple of weeks ago, you can maybe take
2:30
Speaker 1: us through that story.
2:31
Speaker 2: Okay, so it's embarrassing, but I've been an activist since
2:35
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty eight, and I started off with local environmental issues.
2:42
Speaker 2: So when I said I've an activist since nineteen eighty eight,
2:44
Speaker 2: that's when I started organizing meetings. Before then, i'd been
2:48
Speaker 2: going to them, but that's when I started taking responsibility
2:51
Speaker 2: and actually start to make things happen. And so we're
2:56
Speaker 2: I would say most issues boil down to dignity and
2:59
Speaker 2: respect people, that people should be entitled to a decent life,
3:04
Speaker 2: and that's what my concern with environmental problems was that
3:08
Speaker 2: people were living intolerable conditions. And of course that problem
3:13
Speaker 2: cleared up because we don't have any industry anymore.
3:17
Speaker 3: Well, that's one way to solve the problem. Anyway.
3:21
Speaker 2: I got involved in the campaign against id cards from
3:25
Speaker 2: the time that the bill started to be advanced two
3:28
Speaker 2: thousand and five, and I realized in fact that the
3:33
Speaker 2: mainstream campaigns weren't actually doing what they appeared to, and
3:39
Speaker 2: particularly they resisted investigating the link between the ID scheme
3:46
Speaker 2: in Britain and globalization, the fact that this wasn't a
3:50
Speaker 2: British project, this was a multinational project very much the
3:55
Speaker 2: European Union was driving it, not just in Britain, not
4:00
Speaker 2: just in Europe, but across Africa and Asia. And I
4:05
Speaker 2: started to get involved then, trying to raise awareness about
4:08
Speaker 2: that and to make an international opposition to an international
4:14
Speaker 2: problem rather than just isolated national opposition. Anyway, what I realize,
4:23
Speaker 2: of course is the ID system is linked to surveillance,
4:28
Speaker 2: and effectively the ID system creates a system of personal
4:34
Speaker 2: files on every individual against which surveillance data can be collated. That,
4:39
Speaker 2: in fact, is what it's all about, what it's always
4:42
Speaker 2: been about. So what can I tell you? So I
4:49
Speaker 2: would say about ten years ago, campaigners against surveillance started
4:54
Speaker 2: getting really demoralized because we were getting no real support
5:00
Speaker 2: from the public. We felt that we were just documenting
5:07
Speaker 2: our remorseless descent into tyranny in painstaking detail. Unfortunately, the
5:15
Speaker 2: problem in Britain is something called subscription activism. People don't
5:21
Speaker 2: want to take responsibility for doing the work themselves. They
5:26
Speaker 2: want to pay money to somebody else.
5:28
Speaker 3: To do it all for them.
5:30
Speaker 2: And what I think we've proved is that that does
5:35
Speaker 2: not succeed. It does not work. And the recent thing
5:39
Speaker 2: that proved that most of all was the High Court
5:42
Speaker 2: case where Big Brother Watch tried to test the legal
5:49
Speaker 2: basis of facial recognition technology live facial recognition technology. So
5:57
Speaker 2: effectively they proved that we're not want to get anywhere
6:01
Speaker 2: in the courts, and so we've got to actually look
6:05
Speaker 2: to the public. So the mistake that I think most
6:09
Speaker 2: of these campaigns make is imagining, for example, that you
6:13
Speaker 2: can tackle this in the courts, that this is the
6:17
Speaker 2: type of problem that is amenable to that type of solution.
6:22
Speaker 2: This is not actually a sort of a legal problem
6:25
Speaker 2: that the legal process can address. This is actually a
6:29
Speaker 2: democratic problem. The problem is the people are not pushing
6:35
Speaker 2: back against the increasing scope of surveillance. They're not using
6:41
Speaker 2: their democratic rights. So what's happened since nineteen seventy nine
6:51
Speaker 2: the public have been withdrawing from the democratic arena. So
6:56
Speaker 2: what happened in nineteen seventy nine The Conservative election campaign
7:02
Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy nine was the first one to be
7:05
Speaker 2: based upon a mass professional advertising campaign. Before then, election
7:12
Speaker 2: campaigns had primarily relied upon volunteer canvasses. Volunteer participation was
7:20
Speaker 2: a major part of our democratic system. So the Conservatives
7:25
Speaker 2: won in nineteen seventy nine through a professional advertising led campaign,
7:31
Speaker 2: and after that the other parties followed suit. Not only that,
7:35
Speaker 2: but other organizations that had relied upon volunteers, like movements
7:41
Speaker 2: and have got charities, They had previously trained their members
7:48
Speaker 2: and their supporters in volunteer activism democratic activism. Well after
7:54
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy nine, everybody stopped doing it. I think the
7:58
Speaker 2: last organization that really used volunteer activism in a big
8:02
Speaker 2: way relied upon it was CND, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament,
8:07
Speaker 2: and of course that fizzled out pretty much at the end.
8:10
Speaker 3: Of the Cold War.
8:11
Speaker 2: So before that political parties in Britain had actually trained
8:17
Speaker 2: their members how to participate in democracy. There had been
8:22
Speaker 2: a role for people, and ordinary people were trained by
8:27
Speaker 2: large organizations to play their part in democracy. Well that stopped,
8:33
Speaker 2: and there are very few people I know who've received
8:35
Speaker 2: that kind of training, that type of experience of an
8:39
Speaker 2: organization and how people work together. People haveme, I hate
8:43
Speaker 2: to say this, democratically illiterate. They don't actually know what
8:49
Speaker 2: their role is in a democracy. They think it's just
8:52
Speaker 2: about voting in elections, whereas, of course democracy carries on
8:57
Speaker 2: between elections.
9:00
Speaker 3: It should do.
9:00
Speaker 2: Yes, there are all sorts of things where the public
9:03
Speaker 2: are supposed to be consulted, express their opinions, take part.
9:07
Speaker 2: There are consultations, there are inquiries, There are lots of
9:14
Speaker 2: different ways that the public can participate in the decision
9:18
Speaker 2: making process. And as an activist, this has been my
9:22
Speaker 2: primary focus throughout a long career. And so what's happened
9:27
Speaker 2: today is people aren't aware of this, and so they've
9:31
Speaker 2: taken a step back. So the main message I would
9:35
Speaker 2: put across is that we think we live in a
9:39
Speaker 2: stable society. We think that our political stability is static,
9:45
Speaker 2: that it's just a moveable it stays there and if
9:50
Speaker 2: you do nothing, it'll just be inert and stay put. Actually,
9:54
Speaker 2: what people need to appreciate is that our political stability
9:59
Speaker 2: is a dynamic equilibrium and that depends upon you know,
10:06
Speaker 2: maintaining both sides maintaining their effort. It's like a tug
10:11
Speaker 2: of war, so both sides need to tug to keep
10:15
Speaker 2: you know, the handkerchief in the middle right where it's
10:18
Speaker 2: supposed to be.
10:19
Speaker 3: Right.
10:19
Speaker 2: If what's happened is since nineteen seventy nine, one side
10:24
Speaker 2: has just gone away and done something else. They've left
10:27
Speaker 2: it to other people to do democracy on their behalf. Well,
10:31
Speaker 2: that's not the way it works, and that's why one
10:34
Speaker 2: side just pulled the rope away and took it home.
10:39
Speaker 1: So that's interesting about democracy. I'd like to come back
10:42
Speaker 1: to that a little bit later, because I think we're
10:44
Speaker 1: starting to see more and more around the country people
10:46
Speaker 1: starting to organize and come up with local ways to
10:49
Speaker 1: address problems, and that I really believe this is the
10:52
Speaker 1: way that we have to start is locally and then
10:55
Speaker 1: hopefully it spreads throughout the country. One of the things
10:59
Speaker 1: I want to go on too early on around these
11:01
Speaker 1: technologies that we're discussing is, of course, the narrative is
11:05
Speaker 1: that it's for our safety, right, it's you're safe, we
11:08
Speaker 1: can catch things. You're safer if you know everything that
11:11
Speaker 1: everyone is doing. But just reflecting on anecdotally, I've had
11:16
Speaker 1: some situations in the past two years where it didn't
11:20
Speaker 1: help me, even though they said it would help So,
11:21
Speaker 1: for example, my car was broken into a few years
11:24
Speaker 1: ago in Glasgow and they said, well, we'll use the
11:27
Speaker 1: CCTV footage to find who did it. So they found it,
11:31
Speaker 1: but it wasn't helpful because they said, okay, we now
11:34
Speaker 1: see that there have been a couple of men who
11:36
Speaker 1: broke into your car, but that doesn't mean that they
11:39
Speaker 1: could do anything with it because it doesn't tell them
11:41
Speaker 1: how to find them, it doesn't tell them their names.
11:43
Speaker 1: They just saw that two men broke into my car,
11:46
Speaker 1: so that wasn't helpful. And then last year, I think
11:49
Speaker 1: you're aware of this, I had some men follow me
11:51
Speaker 1: around the shop in Little and by the time I've
11:57
Speaker 1: got the sort of the the nerve up to tell
12:00
Speaker 1: anyone about it, they said that basically they only kept
12:03
Speaker 1: the CCTV footage for a certain amount of time and
12:06
Speaker 1: then they had already deleted it, so the police couldn't
12:09
Speaker 1: help me. Little couldn't help me, but apparently this would
12:11
Speaker 1: have been on camera. So that's just two examples of
12:15
Speaker 1: my own experiences where I was told, well, if we
12:18
Speaker 1: have the footage, then we can catch the people who've
12:21
Speaker 1: done these things against you, but it didn't help at all.
12:24
Speaker 1: So this is what I've been thinking about, and i'd
12:27
Speaker 1: like to hear your thoughts on this.
12:29
Speaker 3: Well.
12:29
Speaker 2: First of all, I'm very sorry that you had that experience,
12:33
Speaker 2: but unfortunately it's a very powerful example of what's wrong.
12:37
Speaker 2: So people wouldn't believe the number of cameras that are
12:41
Speaker 2: out there, and they wouldn't understand they could find it
12:45
Speaker 2: difficult to grasp the senses that they're integrated with, so
12:49
Speaker 2: it's not just about a camera watching you. There are
12:52
Speaker 2: lots of electronic devices that are also following us as well.
12:56
Speaker 2: Glasgow is perhaps one of the most intensively surveiled city
13:00
Speaker 2: in Britain. There are something like forty nine thousand cameras
13:04
Speaker 2: in Glasgow, plus.
13:06
Speaker 3: There are a whole array.
13:08
Speaker 2: Of electronic sensors that will pick up things like contactless
13:13
Speaker 2: cars and definitely your mobile phone. So I find it
13:17
Speaker 2: difficult to understand how they couldn't identify too many who
13:21
Speaker 2: broke into your car. In fact, this is ironic. Theft
13:26
Speaker 2: from cars is one of the main areas of alleged
13:31
Speaker 2: success that CCTV has had. That is the supposed to
13:34
Speaker 2: be the area where CCTV has been most successful. The
13:39
Speaker 2: fact is CCTV has had no real impact on crime.
13:44
Speaker 2: As you know, we've had five times more cameras, We've
13:48
Speaker 2: got seven times more say violent crime, crime against the person.
13:52
Speaker 3: So if it's I'm not saying it doesn't solve crimes.
13:57
Speaker 2: I'm just saying it isn't a magic bullet. It has
14:04
Speaker 2: not justified itself. It has not justified the impact it's
14:09
Speaker 2: had upon our privacy and upon our freedom. And we
14:12
Speaker 2: haven't yet seen what CCTV is actually capable of doing
14:17
Speaker 2: in terms of impinging our freedom. I'm quite fearful about
14:22
Speaker 2: what it could be used for in the future.
14:25
Speaker 1: I lived at Glasgow from twenty fifteen to twenty twenty
14:29
Speaker 1: two or twenty twenty three, something like that, and I
14:32
Speaker 1: noticed even before twenty twenty, when we would have expected
14:35
Speaker 1: the surveillance to really be coming in. Of course in
14:37
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, but even those years before that, I was
14:40
Speaker 1: noticing that these smart city things were coming in because
14:44
Speaker 1: I was working at the University of strath Pride at
14:46
Speaker 1: the time, and the university was part of this initiative
14:49
Speaker 1: of quitting these things, and the technologies are great, and
14:52
Speaker 1: the censors and all this, and I could actually see
14:54
Speaker 1: on Google if I was on my phone, and it
14:57
Speaker 1: would tell me the subway stop is really cra or
15:01
Speaker 1: this restaurant has a long wait time, the shop is
15:04
Speaker 1: really busy, and that's been going on for several years now.
15:08
Speaker 1: So what are some of those kinds of technologies. Is
15:11
Speaker 1: that CCTV or orether other kinds of technologies that pick
15:14
Speaker 1: up that kind of data.
15:15
Speaker 2: Well, so there are lots of different names for what
15:21
Speaker 2: this is and what it does. So one name that
15:24
Speaker 2: is something called piece and which is sort of an
15:28
Speaker 2: integration system. Part of it is smart Cities, and they've
15:34
Speaker 2: got various different projects with various different aims. The key
15:39
Speaker 2: thing is, since two thousand and five they've been looking
15:43
Speaker 2: at what's called CCTV integration, which is multiple different ways
15:50
Speaker 2: of identifying people who are in camera images, ways of
15:55
Speaker 2: tracking people between different cameras as they move around, being
15:59
Speaker 2: able to track a person's movements as they moved through
16:02
Speaker 2: a city, and definitely being able to identify them in
16:07
Speaker 2: multiple different ways. And yet they can't find the people
16:11
Speaker 2: who broke into your car, but I bet they can
16:14
Speaker 2: find all of the people who attended a demonstration. And
16:18
Speaker 2: we've seen facial recognition used recently, and Glasgow has had
16:22
Speaker 2: facial recognition since twenty and twelve. So in twenty twenty
16:27
Speaker 2: they couldn't find the people who broke into your car,
16:31
Speaker 2: but you know, they can identify people when they want to,
16:35
Speaker 2: so they can identify. Recently, there have been progress protests
16:40
Speaker 2: against migrant hostels. I'll just mention this because the police
16:45
Speaker 2: have actually said that they identified people at those protests
16:50
Speaker 2: with facial recognition and they prosecuted them, and so you
16:54
Speaker 2: know it is being used against protests and demonstrations. In
16:59
Speaker 2: two thousand and ten and twenty eleven, the police even
17:04
Speaker 2: back then were identifying people who attended protests through facial recognition.
17:11
Speaker 2: So this is an old technology, it's been around a while,
17:15
Speaker 2: it's certainly been having an impact for a long time,
17:18
Speaker 2: and yet it isn't solving crime. It's solving political crime,
17:23
Speaker 2: but it's not solving real crime.
17:27
Speaker 1: And then that note we're seeing more recently as well
17:30
Speaker 1: as people may not be aware that if you use
17:32
Speaker 1: the self checks or even walk into a supermarket these days,
17:35
Speaker 1: they're recording your face from the time you walk in
17:37
Speaker 1: until you pay if you use all of the self
17:39
Speaker 1: check machines. And that's just one other example of maybe
17:42
Speaker 1: it's done out in the city it's owned by these
17:44
Speaker 1: private businesses like Sainsbury's or wherever you go shopping.
17:47
Speaker 2: But it's still well, actually coordinated by a national organization
17:52
Speaker 2: called Facewatch, and that's been operating for I don't know
17:58
Speaker 2: since about seventeen.
18:01
Speaker 1: That's starting to ruin. Let's go inside.
18:03
Speaker 2: So I think one of the things we have to
18:05
Speaker 2: realize is when we talk about, you know, numbers of
18:08
Speaker 2: thousands of cameras in a city, these are not all
18:12
Speaker 2: just the cameras that are owned by the local authority.
18:14
Speaker 2: In fact, you know, even the local authority cameras these
18:17
Speaker 2: days are probably owned by somebody Else's part of a
18:21
Speaker 2: public private partnership. And that's the big thing PPP, public
18:25
Speaker 2: private partnership.
18:26
Speaker 3: Yes, So.
18:29
Speaker 2: What we see is increasingly the cameras inside shops, inside
18:36
Speaker 2: buildings like schools and universities are integrated with the whole
18:43
Speaker 2: camera surveillance system. So when you come off the street
18:46
Speaker 2: into a building, then your movements are picked up by
18:51
Speaker 2: the cameras inside the building.
18:53
Speaker 3: There's nowhere you can go where the state doesn't track you.
18:58
Speaker 2: All of these different cameras systems are operated by say
19:04
Speaker 2: one Internet provider. Of course, all of these cameras are
19:07
Speaker 2: Internet connected. The Internet is the great surveillance.
19:10
Speaker 1: Too, the Internet of Things.
19:12
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, the surveillance enabler.
19:15
Speaker 2: So the cameras inside will be operated by the same
19:20
Speaker 2: Internet provider whose operates the cameras outside, and that Internet
19:25
Speaker 2: provider will also offer video surveillance as a service visas.
19:31
Speaker 2: So basically they're the same people who are watching all
19:35
Speaker 2: of the cameras. So one of the first schemes that
19:38
Speaker 2: we saw like that was in London operated by Virgin
19:42
Speaker 2: Media Business, and another system was in Manchester operated by
19:47
Speaker 2: an Internet provider called Metronet is now called something like
19:53
Speaker 2: four to seven or I think it's called Connectivity or
19:56
Speaker 2: something like. Anyway, at the point is there are several models,
20:00
Speaker 2: it's all the same thing. Wherever you go, there are cameras,
20:05
Speaker 2: they're connected to the Internet and the same people are
20:08
Speaker 2: watching them. It's not like there's a different system inside
20:12
Speaker 2: the shop to outside the shop. There's one organization that's
20:16
Speaker 2: watching them, and they're watching them by AI. So when
20:19
Speaker 2: you're talking about say forty nine thousand cameras in a
20:24
Speaker 2: single city, as you get in Glasgow in one system,
20:28
Speaker 2: they can't be watched by humans. They're watched by AI.
20:33
Speaker 2: It's AI that's tracking you. They've got systems, they've had
20:38
Speaker 2: systems for over fifteen years that are able to join
20:41
Speaker 2: the dots, follow you from camera to camera. And now,
20:46
Speaker 2: of course they're connecting more and more buildings to this.
20:50
Speaker 2: You know, it's getting harder and harder to find anywhere
20:53
Speaker 2: that isn't part of this overarching system.
20:56
Speaker 3: No privacy anywhere, right.
21:00
Speaker 1: I noticed a difference starting in twenty twenty, of course,
21:03
Speaker 1: when they were watching everyone queuing up to go buy groceries,
21:07
Speaker 1: and you know, they had sort of some of those
21:09
Speaker 1: systems with the stop and go systems were allowing a
21:12
Speaker 1: certain number of people into the shops at one time
21:14
Speaker 1: and you know, walk this one way through the aisles
21:17
Speaker 1: and all the ridiculous dystopian experience that was buying groceries
21:21
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty. And it seems as though over the
21:24
Speaker 1: past few years. One things that I've noticed in going
21:26
Speaker 1: in some of the bigger shops is the gates that
21:30
Speaker 1: were installed a few years ago. They were very relatively
21:34
Speaker 1: simple where they were sort of stopped and go, but
21:35
Speaker 1: they seem to have become more technologically advanced over the
21:40
Speaker 1: past couple of years and what I'm worried, because I've
21:42
Speaker 1: done a bit of research into these, is that it
21:45
Speaker 1: looks like they will eventually start to require some sort
21:48
Speaker 1: of ID just to scan just to get into buy
21:50
Speaker 1: your groceries.
21:52
Speaker 3: So gosh, that has that.
21:54
Speaker 2: I think the UK coins actually published an article about that.
21:57
Speaker 2: We have. I think it's called something like Martin's or
22:00
Speaker 2: it's called something like the Terrorism Protection of Premises Act
22:05
Speaker 2: or something like that. Anyway, the idea is that, yes,
22:10
Speaker 2: premises over a certain size and I forget the number
22:13
Speaker 2: that they've set, but it's not that high, will require
22:17
Speaker 2: digital ID to enter the building.
22:21
Speaker 1: Yes, And that's where we get into a really difficult
22:24
Speaker 1: territory where people may not even be aware of walking
22:27
Speaker 1: around the city and knowing they're being tracked. But once
22:30
Speaker 1: they need to go in to buy their lunch, they're
22:32
Speaker 1: going to have to have digital ID. And I'm wondering
22:34
Speaker 1: if that's when it's going to start to get real
22:36
Speaker 1: for people.
22:37
Speaker 2: So I think people actually should get real and understand
22:41
Speaker 2: that they're already being tracked. And the trouble is the
22:44
Speaker 2: public are mostly cooperating with it. So I find that
22:47
Speaker 2: people under the age of forty rarely carry cash because
22:52
Speaker 2: at school they had to buy their school lunch with
22:55
Speaker 2: fingerprinted ID or something like this. They've got used to
22:58
Speaker 2: a cashless environment, so you find people.
23:02
Speaker 3: They have no cash.
23:03
Speaker 2: They never carry cash, even if it's a small purchase.
23:06
Speaker 2: I don't know, a tenpence it and they'd still have
23:08
Speaker 2: to pay by card or by phone.
23:11
Speaker 3: They do not carry any.
23:12
Speaker 2: Cash at all, And of course that is entirely trapped.
23:17
Speaker 2: Every payment they make is trapped. I keep on telling people.
23:23
Speaker 2: For example, if you go out drinking with your friends,
23:27
Speaker 2: pay by cash. Don't pay for alcohol by phone ever,
23:32
Speaker 2: because you know, first of all they're telling the bank.
23:37
Speaker 3: You know, the bank gets to see that. Of course
23:39
Speaker 3: they can work out you're buying alcohol. But Google knows too,
23:43
Speaker 3: and Google, if you're.
23:44
Speaker 2: Paying by phone, will know who you're with, everything that
23:47
Speaker 2: you've done, how late you stay out, how much you drink.
23:51
Speaker 2: Do you really want somebody who's compiling a social credit
23:55
Speaker 2: score on you to know all of that information?
23:58
Speaker 3: Don't you want to keep some of that hidden? Of course.
24:02
Speaker 2: The other thing is if you're paying by cash, you
24:05
Speaker 2: only take out as much cash as he prepared to spend.
24:07
Speaker 3: Yeah, if you don't go too far.
24:10
Speaker 1: I am that expending cap there right. Yeah. I actually
24:13
Speaker 1: had an experience a few years ago. I was applying
24:16
Speaker 1: for a loan at my bank and I went in
24:18
Speaker 1: person to speak to them, and she actually looked at
24:21
Speaker 1: my recent transactions. This was before I think paying my
24:24
Speaker 1: filling was even possible, but she could still see all
24:26
Speaker 1: the transactions on my debit card, and she was trying
24:29
Speaker 1: to determine if I was a good, good use of
24:32
Speaker 1: my money and if I was budgeting well. And so
24:35
Speaker 1: she actually said, it looks like you spent five pounds
24:37
Speaker 1: on an uber ride. What was that for? That couldn't
24:39
Speaker 1: have been very far? Why didn't you walk?
24:41
Speaker 2: And that should be private actually nobody's business but your
24:44
Speaker 2: own exactly.
24:45
Speaker 1: And I said, well, it was late at night, I
24:47
Speaker 1: needed to get home safely. I was by myself, and
24:49
Speaker 1: then I was thinking to myself, I shouldn't have to
24:51
Speaker 1: explain this to get alone. But it's it's them, you know,
24:54
Speaker 1: going into your private business and not trying to understand
24:57
Speaker 1: what you do and understand your lifestyle. And somehow that
25:00
Speaker 1: would what maybe or maybe not, would make me credit
25:03
Speaker 1: worthy of getting this loan I was trying to get,
25:06
Speaker 1: which I was trying to get to build my credit rating. Actually,
25:10
Speaker 1: so it was Yeah, it was a very stressful experience,
25:15
Speaker 1: but it's it's that, like you're saying, that ability to
25:19
Speaker 1: track everything that we're doing, and the work that I
25:22
Speaker 1: did in my background when I was still working as
25:24
Speaker 1: a full time informatics researcher was the idea of aggregating
25:28
Speaker 1: reaggregating data, right, So you have your bank account information,
25:32
Speaker 1: you're tracked by your let's say, your Amazon purchases or
25:35
Speaker 1: your Uber purchases or your Google searches, and that when
25:38
Speaker 1: it really gets dangerous, in my opinion, is when they
25:41
Speaker 1: put all those bits together and then they get a
25:43
Speaker 1: complete picture of what you're doing. So it's not just
25:45
Speaker 1: your Amazon or your Uber or your bank, but it's everything.
25:49
Speaker 2: So actually, it's a good place to talk about this
25:52
Speaker 2: here in Newcastle because this is actually a very good
25:55
Speaker 2: example of the problem. So here we are, we're in
25:59
Speaker 2: a city that focused primarily on electronic surveillance of the citizens.
26:05
Speaker 3: Newcastle is the.
26:06
Speaker 2: Pioneer of something called the urban observatory, where they are
26:12
Speaker 2: watching citizens through various forms of electronic sensors and this
26:18
Speaker 2: is the primary form of surveillance in Newcastle, rather than cameras,
26:23
Speaker 2: so I think Newcastle's got ten times as many sensors
26:28
Speaker 2: as Glasgow, which is a really intensively seveiled city. So
26:33
Speaker 2: Newcastle is actually a good example of this more electronic
26:37
Speaker 2: sensors than cameras, and it's an experiment, it's the model
26:42
Speaker 2: for the future.
26:44
Speaker 1: Great. So I think you have some statistics on some
26:48
Speaker 1: of the cities around around the UK and those numbers
26:51
Speaker 1: that you have, do you ought to share some of those?
26:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the numbers are actually quite frightening when we
26:57
Speaker 2: talk about these numbers. These are not the owned by
27:01
Speaker 2: the local authority. This is an integrated system, including the
27:05
Speaker 2: cameras indoors, in shops, in universities, in schools, but they
27:10
Speaker 2: all form part of a network that's under one control,
27:14
Speaker 2: one system. So in London there are something like nine
27:18
Speaker 2: hundred and forty two thousand cameras getting on for a million,
27:23
Speaker 2: just in one city under in one control system. In
27:28
Speaker 2: Birmingham there are eighty eight thousand. In sorry, in Leeds
27:33
Speaker 2: the next one there are sixty thousand, nine hundred, Glasgow
27:40
Speaker 2: forty nine thousand, we mentioned before, Manchester forty two thousand,
27:45
Speaker 2: five hundred, Nottingham twenty five thousand, five hundred, these are
27:49
Speaker 2: sort of the typical numbers that you sort of start
27:52
Speaker 2: to see in large cities with a modern surveillance system.
27:57
Speaker 2: Newcastle tries to claim though, that there are only three.
28:01
Speaker 3: Hundred and fifty cameras on the streets. Sure you can
28:06
Speaker 3: believe that if you want.
28:07
Speaker 1: To, and that is that according to the council. Is
28:12
Speaker 1: that where that number comes from.
28:13
Speaker 4: Yes, So the question is whether or not that's the
28:17
Speaker 4: whole story, whether or not in fact, there are other
28:20
Speaker 4: cameras that they have access to, So it's the cameras
28:24
Speaker 4: that they own, but are they all of the cameras.
28:27
Speaker 1: We've been walking around a little bit as you know,
28:29
Speaker 1: as our viewers will see a few different scenes around
28:32
Speaker 1: here in the city's center of Newcastle, and we've been
28:35
Speaker 1: taking photos of cameras and other types of equipment that
28:38
Speaker 1: we've been seeing as we just sort of walk around.
28:42
Speaker 1: It is something that I think people should start looking
28:46
Speaker 1: around when they're just walking through any sort of urban
28:49
Speaker 1: area or even maybe even increasingly rural areas, because we
28:52
Speaker 1: don't really necessarily look up enough around us to see
28:56
Speaker 1: what's going on. And hopefully we can get some of
28:58
Speaker 1: these photos incorporated into the video so that we can
29:01
Speaker 1: see some examples. Right now, we're standing here at Old
29:04
Speaker 1: Dublin Square, just outside the main shopping area, and just
29:08
Speaker 1: right here we've already seen several examples of security equipment.
29:11
Speaker 1: We don't necessarily know what they do, but they're all around.
29:15
Speaker 2: So there are these mysterious white boxes on top of
29:18
Speaker 2: lampposts and whatever bus signs. You wonder what are they
29:24
Speaker 2: what they're doing, and we don't really know. And this
29:26
Speaker 2: is the whole point. These systems have appeared. We weren't
29:29
Speaker 2: really consulted. They just grew kind of organically. Well organically
29:33
Speaker 2: if you're spending a lot of money every year and
29:36
Speaker 2: if you've got an agenda strategic vision of connecting everything
29:40
Speaker 2: together and a plan that.
29:42
Speaker 3: You with objectives.
29:44
Speaker 2: So yes, but we don't know what these things are,
29:50
Speaker 2: and that's the intention. So one of the things we've
29:53
Speaker 2: found is that it's actually quite difficult to find out
29:56
Speaker 2: information about which cities have got which system, what surveillance software,
30:04
Speaker 2: who supplied it, because they operate on a principle of
30:08
Speaker 2: security by obscurity, so they don't advertise this stuff.
30:12
Speaker 3: They keep it low key.
30:14
Speaker 2: Very often people ask freedom of information requests and there's
30:18
Speaker 2: a security exemption, you know that you don't have to
30:20
Speaker 2: ask answer if it might impede security or crime fighting.
30:25
Speaker 3: So there we go.
30:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I would actually encourage people not to accept that.
30:30
Speaker 2: I think it's time. We've just got a whole load
30:32
Speaker 2: of new councilors electeds. There's a new political party. Let's
30:37
Speaker 2: see what they're worth. Let's start asking them what are
30:42
Speaker 2: they prepared to do about this issue? Are they prepared
30:44
Speaker 2: to look for answers? Are they going to find the
30:46
Speaker 2: information that we haven't had up till now? New political party,
30:51
Speaker 2: let's find out what their position is.
30:54
Speaker 1: Well, anythink Newcastle, where we didn't have any sort of
30:57
Speaker 1: there's already that came here in the elections. I think
31:00
Speaker 1: there was not, you know, sort of south of the Tyne.
31:03
Speaker 1: I think there was a reform went into all of
31:06
Speaker 1: the councils down there, including Gateshead and so on, But
31:09
Speaker 1: Newcastle didn't have any sort of majority. So we'll see
31:12
Speaker 1: what happens there if that makes a difference in who's
31:15
Speaker 1: going to try to get power in the next election.
31:18
Speaker 1: So all of these things can make a difference as
31:20
Speaker 1: to whether or not they actually take any action as well.
31:24
Speaker 2: Yes, So it's amazing how these things continue really without
31:29
Speaker 2: any intervention by councilors, and how little difference councilors seem
31:34
Speaker 2: to make.
31:35
Speaker 3: One of the observations that.
31:37
Speaker 2: I've found about local government over the years is that
31:41
Speaker 2: they speak a lot more to other local councils and
31:45
Speaker 2: to national government than they do to their own elected councilors.
31:49
Speaker 2: It's almost like there are planning groups that just consist
31:55
Speaker 2: of unelected permanent officials and they make the police and
32:00
Speaker 2: then once these policies have been made, they're offered up
32:04
Speaker 2: to the elected councilors to approve them. They don't really
32:08
Speaker 2: form them, they don't the elected councilors don't drive the policy.
32:13
Speaker 1: That's right. That's right, and I think put something to remember,
32:15
Speaker 1: And we've been talking about this on UK column just
32:18
Speaker 1: in the last couple of days, this day of filming.
32:20
Speaker 1: The local elections were just last week, and that's what
32:23
Speaker 1: we've been saying, is that you know, to look at
32:25
Speaker 1: not just the local councilors, but also what they're trying
32:29
Speaker 1: to do, which is essentially to create destabilization and chaos
32:32
Speaker 1: around the country by taking out some of the things
32:35
Speaker 1: that are in place and replacing them with other things
32:38
Speaker 1: that this may be a drive towards creating what Brian
32:42
Speaker 1: Gerrish is calling new order out of chaos, because we
32:46
Speaker 1: can by saying we're electing reform, we're electing Greens, we're
32:49
Speaker 1: electing other people, a couple of independents restore potentially well,
32:53
Speaker 1: that then creates a sense of chaos because we've had
32:57
Speaker 1: this order in place for a long time, which clearly
32:59
Speaker 1: isn't working. But it will be interesting to see with
33:02
Speaker 1: these new parties that are coming into power we'll do
33:05
Speaker 1: about these issues, like these surveillance technologies that are overtaking
33:08
Speaker 1: our cities.
33:09
Speaker 2: So let's come back to something I said before. Sure,
33:12
Speaker 2: democracy is not something that happens it's elections. It's what
33:17
Speaker 2: happens between elections. Yes, and this is our opportunity to
33:21
Speaker 2: find out, you know, what we can do, what influence
33:24
Speaker 2: we can have, whether or not new parties coming into
33:28
Speaker 2: office actually makes any difference at all. It's our opportunity
33:32
Speaker 2: to find out what the new system is, how it works,
33:36
Speaker 2: and if it doesn't work, we've got to find out
33:39
Speaker 2: and we've got to say something about it. Remember, this
33:41
Speaker 2: is a tug of war, you know, we have to
33:45
Speaker 2: take part in this to maintain a dynamic equilibrium. If
33:49
Speaker 2: we just leave it to somebody else, if we leave
33:51
Speaker 2: it to the experts, we know what happens. You know,
33:55
Speaker 2: the one side wins. They take the rope home. We
34:00
Speaker 2: see these funny little white boxes here and there and
34:02
Speaker 2: everywhere on various posts around the town. And this is
34:06
Speaker 2: part of the Urban Observatory, this system of wireless sensing
34:12
Speaker 2: that's been embedded into Newcastle City Center, and there are
34:18
Speaker 2: a number of schemes that have contributed to this. You've
34:22
Speaker 2: got these anonymous, strange looking like boxes. We don't know
34:25
Speaker 2: what's inside them, but we know that they're gathering information
34:28
Speaker 2: about us. They're tracking people as they move around town
34:31
Speaker 2: by recording their electronic devices. So we've heard a little
34:37
Speaker 2: bit a bit how these systems work. For example, in
34:40
Speaker 2: Gatesheads Metro Center, we know that the authority that runs
34:45
Speaker 2: that business that center has been tracking people around by
34:53
Speaker 2: the electronic signals of the devices and so where they're
34:57
Speaker 2: interested they call it a foot four measuring footfall. But
35:01
Speaker 2: of course people are identifiable. That's the whole point. They're
35:04
Speaker 2: tracking people by their ID numbers. So if you look
35:08
Speaker 2: at the cameras, the preferred way of connecting a camera
35:12
Speaker 2: these days is by Wi Fi because they found it
35:15
Speaker 2: was so much cheaper. It costs a lot of money
35:18
Speaker 2: to have a permanent, dedicated cable to a camera, and
35:22
Speaker 2: it's so much cheaper, about tenth of the cost to
35:25
Speaker 2: have a Wi Fi connection. So that's how cameras amounted
35:28
Speaker 2: these days. And it also makes a lot of cameras redeployable.
35:32
Speaker 2: If you find it's in the wrong place, well, there's
35:34
Speaker 2: no cable to move, it's just Wi Fi connection. There's
35:37
Speaker 2: no connection. You can move it anywhere you want. But
35:40
Speaker 2: you know, if you want a new view, if you
35:41
Speaker 2: want a new place, easy and a new camera can
35:45
Speaker 2: appear anytime.
35:47
Speaker 1: And it's true as well for Wi Fi connections at
35:49
Speaker 1: home as well, so for people that have the Amazon
35:52
Speaker 1: ringdoorbells and these kinds of things are also working through
35:55
Speaker 1: Wi Fi, which, as you've said before to me that
35:58
Speaker 1: that's just as much of a concern that you're whoever's
36:02
Speaker 1: coming in and out of your home is now being seen.
36:04
Speaker 2: I can't get the idea why anyone would want, say,
36:09
Speaker 2: a Wi Fi doorbell connected to the Internet through a
36:13
Speaker 2: service provider who offers you that you can see who's
36:17
Speaker 2: coming in out of your home through your phone, because
36:20
Speaker 2: that means effectively, it's not just you can see this anybody.
36:24
Speaker 2: They don't really provide the sort of privacy protection that
36:28
Speaker 2: people imagine. So we've seen it in the United States
36:32
Speaker 2: how police departments have got control of all of the
36:36
Speaker 2: ring cameras in the neighborhood and they've used that as
36:40
Speaker 2: a surveillance network. They can watch people on the street
36:43
Speaker 2: through people's doorbell cameras and they of course, people think
36:50
Speaker 2: it's an advantage that your doorbell. The system gives you
36:55
Speaker 2: a readoubt of who's entered and left your home through
37:00
Speaker 2: facial recognition.
37:01
Speaker 3: People think, oh, well that's great.
37:02
Speaker 2: If my daughter's got a new boyfriend and I don't
37:05
Speaker 2: like him, well I can monitor all of that. I
37:07
Speaker 2: can make sure he doesn't come in the house when
37:09
Speaker 2: I'm out. You see, somebody else is getting a list
37:13
Speaker 2: of everyone who comes in and out of your house
37:15
Speaker 2: when you and when you know if you come home late,
37:18
Speaker 2: they know about it, and as we've found out, somehow
37:22
Speaker 2: that's going to end up in your social credit score.
37:27
Speaker 4: Well.
37:28
Speaker 1: And this also can go into the smart appliances, the
37:30
Speaker 1: smart devices, the smart meters, which people are aware of
37:33
Speaker 1: that watch you Kake column. If we look at the
37:36
Speaker 1: apps that can now control our washing machines and our
37:38
Speaker 1: dishwashers if we want to use them. So that's even
37:41
Speaker 1: tracking your usage of your electricity, of your water when
37:45
Speaker 1: you put your clothes into the washer. All of these
37:48
Speaker 1: things are these apps that are connecting and watching everything
37:52
Speaker 1: that we do inside of our houses. Never mind what
37:54
Speaker 1: is happening at our front door.
37:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, so what a utopian dream world or not? So
38:04
Speaker 2: they can turn your washing machine off if they think
38:06
Speaker 2: you're using too much.
38:07
Speaker 3: Electricity, maybe turn your freezer off too.
38:14
Speaker 2: I must say it's always been a pretty unattractive proposition.
38:17
Speaker 2: I mean this idea that somehow your smart fridge was
38:20
Speaker 2: going to tell you whether or not your milk was
38:22
Speaker 2: out of date. So you when you went into the
38:24
Speaker 2: supermarket you get a message on your phone telling you
38:27
Speaker 2: to buy buy milk and buy cornflakes.
38:30
Speaker 3: Who wants that?
38:35
Speaker 1: Well, you know, it's just an example of the data
38:38
Speaker 1: collection that they're doing about us. Which then you know,
38:40
Speaker 1: if you look at how apps are connected, and we
38:43
Speaker 1: look at, for example, what the NHS might be collecting
38:45
Speaker 1: on us. And then you go to the GP because
38:48
Speaker 1: you're not feeling well and they say, whatble your apps
38:50
Speaker 1: is that you've been eating far too much ice cream
38:52
Speaker 1: and smoking cigarettes and drinking lots of wine every night.
38:55
Speaker 1: So why are you here. You need to go, you know,
38:57
Speaker 1: not do those things, and we know exactly what you've
38:59
Speaker 1: been doing. And so then that's the problem with having
39:03
Speaker 1: all these connected devices and connected data is that they
39:06
Speaker 1: can track everything that we're doing, and therefore can deny
39:09
Speaker 1: us or grant us things to permission or not to
39:12
Speaker 1: do things based on our lifestyle habits and who we
39:15
Speaker 1: talk to and how long we sleep. We have watches
39:19
Speaker 1: that can track how many hours we sleep and how
39:21
Speaker 1: well we sleep as well.
39:24
Speaker 2: The state will know more about you than you know
39:26
Speaker 2: about yourself. Yes, and they say, this is the future.
39:31
Speaker 2: It's the source of our future economic growth. The data economy.
39:35
Speaker 2: Selling our privacy is going to make them a profit
39:39
Speaker 2: and that's economic growth.
39:42
Speaker 1: Kind of a pleasant afternoon, despite the dystopian topic of
39:46
Speaker 1: today's conversation, but it's been great talking right here in
39:49
Speaker 1: the middle of Newcastle with you as well. We're unfortunately
39:52
Speaker 1: running short out of time, and I wanted you to
39:54
Speaker 1: give a little bit of an overview of the most
39:56
Speaker 1: important things that you think the viewers need to hear
39:59
Speaker 1: from today's conversation, so I'm going to pass it to
40:02
Speaker 1: you from here.
40:03
Speaker 2: Okay, well, pretty much this is the punchline. This is
40:06
Speaker 2: the bit that I want people to remember. So first
40:09
Speaker 2: of all, what's the problem.
40:12
Speaker 3: What's new in what we're going to do?
40:20
Speaker 2: What can you do as viewers, what we want you
40:23
Speaker 2: to do, How you can make a difference. So let's
40:27
Speaker 2: start with the problem. So there are four main parts
40:31
Speaker 2: to this. So first of all, at this point, all
40:35
Speaker 2: of the legal options to try and stop CCTV and
40:40
Speaker 2: facial recognition in public spaces, in our lives, in the
40:43
Speaker 2: growth of surveillance, they've been exhausted. You know, no point
40:47
Speaker 2: in looking at any further at those. What's been proved
40:50
Speaker 2: at this point is the Human Rights Act doesn't really
40:54
Speaker 2: mean anything. This whole idea about balancing our rights against
41:00
Speaker 2: the needs of the state means it's like cheese pairing.
41:03
Speaker 2: We get more and more of our rights cut away
41:06
Speaker 2: every time it goes back to court.
41:08
Speaker 3: We're getting nowhere.
41:10
Speaker 2: So where the next thing is they've integrated the National
41:15
Speaker 2: ID database with the surveillance system. That is a really
41:21
Speaker 2: huge change. The Home Secretary Shabina Mahmood has actually said
41:27
Speaker 2: that her aim is to create a panopticon. That was
41:31
Speaker 2: her ambition to create a system where the state would
41:35
Speaker 2: have its eyes upon us all the time. And of course,
41:39
Speaker 2: the other thing that's changed is the amazing erosion.
41:43
Speaker 3: Of our rights.
41:45
Speaker 2: That there are new laws against protest, that we see
41:49
Speaker 2: the things that we're allowed to do. Over not just
41:54
Speaker 2: the past year, but the past three years, governments of
41:58
Speaker 2: different parties have pretty much carried through a unified agenda
42:03
Speaker 2: to rewrite our rights. And one of the things that
42:08
Speaker 2: I've noticed is that there is a climate of fear
42:11
Speaker 2: amongst people. Increasingly, we find that when we ask people
42:16
Speaker 2: to take part in anything, they're afraid. They say things like,
42:22
Speaker 2: I'm scared of losing my job. If I lost my job,
42:25
Speaker 2: I'd lose my home, I'd lose everything. So what I
42:28
Speaker 2: want to say to people is be reassured. We're not
42:32
Speaker 2: going to put you in that situation.
42:34
Speaker 3: Right.
42:35
Speaker 2: We are not going to ask you to do anything
42:37
Speaker 2: that is going to put you at risk. We want
42:40
Speaker 2: our people to feel happy about what they're getting involved with.
42:45
Speaker 2: So what we're involved in is democratic activism. We want
42:51
Speaker 2: exemplary behavior. We are making sure that we do not
42:55
Speaker 2: break even the new laws against protest.
42:58
Speaker 3: We want to keep everything we.
43:00
Speaker 2: Do below the threshold where it becomes a matter of
43:05
Speaker 2: state interest where you have to consult the police. Now
43:10
Speaker 2: what's different, what's new is we're not going to try
43:14
Speaker 2: and use experts. We're not going to try and go
43:17
Speaker 2: through the courts. We're not asking the public to just
43:20
Speaker 2: give us money. We're begging you actually to get involved.
43:27
Speaker 2: This is the only thing ultimately that works at the minute.
43:33
Speaker 2: The government has had it all its own way. This
43:36
Speaker 2: is a tug of war. We need to start tugging back.
43:40
Speaker 2: So what are our aims? I think this is really important.
43:43
Speaker 2: What do we hope to achieve. So, if you've looked
43:49
Speaker 2: in recent years, the opposition to greater surveillance has been
43:53
Speaker 2: kept out of the media. We don't really see that
43:57
Speaker 2: voice mentioned on the news, on tav in the papers.
44:02
Speaker 2: We've been shut out. Somehow, we've got to break in.
44:06
Speaker 2: We've got to demand acknowledgment. So the government has had
44:11
Speaker 2: pretty much a one sided fight. They have not been
44:16
Speaker 2: forced to acknowledge there is no consensus in favor of
44:21
Speaker 2: greater surveillance. They have not been forced to explain why
44:26
Speaker 2: they want more surveillance when it's doing nothing to control crime.
44:31
Speaker 2: We have to move things and that requires the public
44:37
Speaker 2: being willing to not show their faces but show their support.
44:44
Speaker 2: So we've devised a format of protest where people can
44:49
Speaker 2: hide their faces, hide their identities, which of course what
44:52
Speaker 2: we want them to do, and yet still be conspicuous.
44:57
Speaker 2: So we've got this new format of protest where people
45:00
Speaker 2: wrap themselves in silver foil sheets. It's immediately recognizable. People
45:06
Speaker 2: are going to see this and they're going to get
45:08
Speaker 2: the message about what this is about. What we want
45:12
Speaker 2: is we want people all around the country to start
45:17
Speaker 2: holding these little protests of their own and send us
45:20
Speaker 2: the pictures. If we can build up a portfolio of
45:24
Speaker 2: say fifty or one hundred protests, little protests around the country,
45:29
Speaker 2: you don't have to say who you are, You just
45:31
Speaker 2: need to take a picture and say where it is, right,
45:35
Speaker 2: so that we know that there are protests all around Britain.
45:39
Speaker 2: Eventually we can make an argument, a cumulative case that's
45:45
Speaker 2: large enough that we will be acknowledged. Right, this is
45:50
Speaker 2: the main thing we would like people to contact us,
45:53
Speaker 2: So we have a telegram group Stop facial recognition and
46:00
Speaker 2: contact me by email. So my email address is Nathan
46:06
Speaker 2: nat h An at no hyphen CCTV dot org dot UK.
46:14
Speaker 2: Please contact me. We'd love to hear from you. You
46:17
Speaker 2: can maybe send us a picture of your own local
46:19
Speaker 2: protest or you can send it to our telegram group.
46:23
Speaker 3: But most of all, we would like people.
46:25
Speaker 2: To change their habits, so please be aware you are
46:30
Speaker 2: actually helping to build a surveillance state. When you pay
46:36
Speaker 2: by phone, pay by card, please try to use cash
46:40
Speaker 2: as often as you can. I know there are times
46:43
Speaker 2: these days you need to purchase online, so you've got
46:46
Speaker 2: to use a card, but there are lots of times
46:48
Speaker 2: when it's much easier to pay by cash.
46:51
Speaker 3: It's a habit, learn to develop it.
46:54
Speaker 2: And.
46:57
Speaker 3: I would like we would like you to approach.
47:00
Speaker 2: Your newly elected councilors and ask them what they think
47:04
Speaker 2: about this. We'd like to get a profile of what
47:08
Speaker 2: the parties actually think. There are parties that have got
47:11
Speaker 2: power now that haven't had powered before, some haven't existed before.
47:16
Speaker 2: Well where do they stand. We'd like to make them
47:19
Speaker 2: get off the fence. We can't just do this by ourselves.
47:23
Speaker 2: We need your help. We need the public to participate
47:27
Speaker 2: in this. There are lots of things that you can
47:29
Speaker 2: do that would make a difference. Another thing is we
47:35
Speaker 2: know very little about the CCTV systems around the country.
47:39
Speaker 2: They practice this system of security by obscurity, where they
47:46
Speaker 2: tell us as little as they count about what they're
47:48
Speaker 2: doing and how it's progressing. Nobody says we've added another
47:52
Speaker 2: ten thousand cameras to our.
47:54
Speaker 3: Local CCTV system.
47:56
Speaker 2: They don't want to advertise that, partly because not to
48:00
Speaker 2: like crime, but because the public would oppose it. Well,
48:03
Speaker 2: we've got to expose that they're not going to do
48:06
Speaker 2: it for us. We've got to take the initiative. Democracy
48:10
Speaker 2: is a tug of war. It requires all of us
48:13
Speaker 2: to participate. We can't leave it to experts. We've all
48:17
Speaker 2: of us got to be involved. That's the message. If
48:20
Speaker 2: we don't do this together, we lose together.
48:24
Speaker 1: And could you tell me a little bit about your
48:26
Speaker 1: organization that you mentioned so that people know a little
48:29
Speaker 1: about Is it no cc TV?
48:31
Speaker 2: Yes, So we've existed since two thousand and seven, Oh wow,
48:36
Speaker 2: and we're part of an international coalition of similar groups.
48:42
Speaker 2: There was a series of meetings in Brussels, the Freedom
48:46
Speaker 2: Not Fear meetings, and so a series of different organizations
48:51
Speaker 2: was formed to fight against the encroachments of the totality
48:57
Speaker 2: state and one of them was the International Working Group
49:01
Speaker 2: on Video Surveillance, So we are actually part of an
49:05
Speaker 2: international coalition of similar groups throughout Europe.
49:10
Speaker 1: Okay, well, thanks very much. I think that covers everything.
49:13
Speaker 1: We've covered a lot through this little recording today, and
49:16
Speaker 1: I think that viewers will really greatly benefit from this
49:19
Speaker 1: because I think it's so important for UK column viewers
49:23
Speaker 1: to see that people can actually do something about what
49:26
Speaker 1: they're facing, but they need to be aware of what
49:28
Speaker 1: it is first and then secondly what they can do.
49:31
Speaker 1: And Nathan, I just want to say that you and
49:32
Speaker 1: your group have been a wonderful example of doing something
49:35
Speaker 1: over the years, and I hope you continue to do so,
49:38
Speaker 1: and I hope our viewers will continue to follow your
49:41
Speaker 1: example and that we'll see lots of photos coming in
49:43
Speaker 1: if people wrapped in tenfoil around the country.
49:46
Speaker 2: So thank you, because I mean UK Colin has broken
49:51
Speaker 2: the media blockade. It's so difficult for this sort of
49:56
Speaker 2: issue to get any coverage in the mainstream media except
50:00
Speaker 2: from a pro establishment viewpoint. But really we need to
50:04
Speaker 2: reach your viewers. You know, these are people who are
50:08
Speaker 2: more inclined to activism than anyone in the mainstream. Together,
50:14
Speaker 2: we can force the government to acknowledge there is no
50:17
Speaker 2: public consensus for what they're doing.
50:21
Speaker 1: Thank you again, Nathan. Again, this has been Dianassmusson here
50:23
Speaker 1: with Nathan Allerby in the city center of Newcastle and
50:26
Speaker 1: what has been a variably windy and sunny and rainy afternoon.
50:30
Speaker 1: But thank you again Nathan for your time today. I've
50:32
Speaker 1: really enjoyed it.
50:33
Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you.